News
In January 2008, Port Lympne Wild Animal Park’s seven year old female red panda, Shu Fang - Chinese for “kind, gentle and sweet” - got a new male mate, six year old Yoda, who arrived from Blackpool Zoo as part of an international breeding programme for endangered species. They were kept well away from the snow leopard, which is one of their natural predators! Yoda, alone in an enclosure with Shu Fang, was reportedly already showing interest in Shu Fang, though but red pandas are by nature solitary and arboreal, so it may be some time before we hear the patter of tiny paws. Still, Shu Fang’s sister, Li Yee, has had four litters at Port Lympne with her mate Wing Wor, so the omens are good.
Grumeti, one of 15 black rhino housed at the Park, celebrated her first birthday that month, having been born at the start of 2007 to mother, Etna, aged 13. And as rhinos are notoriously very difficult to breed in captivity, and only 3100 are thought to exist in the wild, every addition to the rhino population counts.