The National Zoo’s beloved bears are set to leave this month, while the loan agreement for the country’s only other pandas, at Zoo Atlanta, is expiring next year.

The National Zoo’s beloved bears are set to leave this month, while the loan agreement for the country’s only other pandas, at Zoo Atlanta, is expiring next year.

Some of the last giant pandas in the United States are heading back to China.

The National Zoo announced last week that its three pandas — Mei Xiang, Tian Tian and their 3-year-old male cub, Xiao Qi Ji — will return to China by Nov. 15, earlier than expected.

Panda fans have been flocking to say goodbye to the black-and-white bears, who have long been one of the zoo’s main attractions.

  • queermunist she/her
    21·
    11 months ago

    This isn’t true at all.

    The reality is that pandas can not adapt to captivity, not that they’re shitty animals that deserve to die. A zoo is not a panda’s habitat.

    And because there’s no wild habitat for them to live in and because they were raised in captivity (and so are unable to return to the wild that no longer exists) they are effectively already extinct. These pandas are ghosts we keep around to feel better about ourselves.