SD Zoo Blog about Pandys - Part 1

Over the past two months, I have been helping the San Diego Zoo’s panda keepers. It has been more than thrilling—I didn’t have any expectations, and yet those “non-expectations” were somehow exceeded! Being a panda narrator has been a great experience, and I have learned so much about an animal so few get to actually see up close. After watching these amazing bears and talking about them for three years with our guests, I was delighted to respond with a “YES!” when asked to help the keepers, before I even knew all the details. This will be the first of a few blogs about how each day occurs down in Panda Canyon.




I clock in at the Zoo at 6 a.m. The day starts with prepping medicine for the musk deer that the panda keepers also take care of and meds for adult panda Gao Gao. He gets peppermint Tums calcium supplementation—Gao loves them! We also sort the daily produce and biscuit treats and make Gao Gao’s bamboo bread, which smells a lot like tamales! Gao’s bread is a softer substitution to his diet and includes low-starch, high-fiber biscuits, dried bamboo leaves, water, and plain gelatin to stick it all together before it is steamed for 50 minutes; he gets 3 loaves a day, which round out to be about 25 ounces (700 grams) each.



Once that is all prepped, we shift the bears into their bedroom areas and start cleaning their exhibits. The morning cleanup is always the longest, mainly because the pandas make such a mess overnight, plus we rake up other leaves and debris throughout the exhibits. Bai Yun and Yun Zi are usually awake and waiting for us; young Xiao Liwu is, 80 percent of the time, still asleep up in the tree. When “Mr. Wu” is awake and on the ground, he usually shifts off exhibit when asked, with some honey water as an incentive. He is much bigger up close than you would expect but still as cute as ever!



Once the bears are in their back bedrooms, we give Bai Yun and Yun Zi some bamboo culm (the hard stalk) as a snack while they wait for us to clean. If Mr. Wu shifts off, we give him some thinner, softer branches with leaves.



Yun Zi is, by far, the messiest, and although his exhibit is smaller than Bai Yun and Mr. Wu’s exhibit, it takes longer to clean. He sleeps on top of his hollowed-out tree trunk, which we call his Keebler tree. That is the hardest to clean and hose off, and we have to climb a ladder to do so. We gather up all of the leftover bamboo from the night before, the big pieces anyways, and tie it back up and re-weigh it to record how much the pandas ate.



We empty and hose out the pools, clean their drinkers, and rake up the smaller bits of bamboo and their poop (which, strangely enough, smells like rotting pumpkins to me). Mr. Wu is now pooping regularly, but his deposits are usually pretty dry and look like chopped-up hay. He is mainly eating leaves but has started to eat bamboo branches, twigs, and even thin parts of culm in small bites. Xiao Liwu still hasn’t quite figured out how to strip the outer layer of bark off yet.



Finally, we bring out the new, fresh bamboo, and spread their treats and bamboo throughout the exhibit. Sometimes we add some enrichment toys or scents. I have noticed that cinnamon is Bai Yun’s absolute favorite; she rubs it all over herself. But we have also used apple pie- and lavender-scented sprays as well as a few different spices and perfumes. We shift the bears back on exhibit, and the day continues with…. Stay tuned for Part 2!



Nick Orrantia is a panda narrator at the San Diego Zoo.