Bao Bao the Panda Leaves the Beltway Behind to Breed in China

http://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/21/us/bao-bao-panda-washington-china.html

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WASHINGTON — Guided by a police escort and with a bounty of bamboo, apples, biscuits and sweet potatoes secure, the motorcade carrying one of Washington’s most visible celebrities on Tuesday hurtled down Interstate 66 as she braced for a 16-hour flight to Chengdu, China.

Bao Bao, the National Zoo’s beloved giant panda, bade a formal and highly publicized goodbye to the only home she had known since her 2013 birth — her first time leaving Washington. As part of a “cooperative breeding program” with the China Wildlife Conservation Association, pandas born here must leave for a new home in China by the age of 4.

The National Zoo’s giant pandas have become a part of Washington lore, ridiculed for their sloth and exalted in internet memes for their tumbles in the snow. In 2015, Michelle Obama attended a naming ceremony at the zoo for Bao Bao’s brother, Bei Bei.

Flocks of panda fans have followed Bao Bao “from the time she was born on camera,” said Laurie Thompson, an assistant curator of giant pandas at the zoo. “She’s kind of our little special miracle girl.”

“We get a lot of people who come just to see pandas, and then we hope they see the rest of the zoo,” Ms. Thompson said. Over the weekend, she said, visitors from across the country and Canada came just to say one last goodbye.

On Tuesday, reporters and staff members in an otherwise empty zoo gathered outside Bao Bao’s woodsy exhibit to watch her being prepared for a final exit. A thrilled spokeswoman declared that the panda had been spotted climbing a tree and scratching her backside for local camera crews earlier in the day. Before the 205-pound panda was called to a custom-built crate, Bao Bao slumped facedown over a log in a predeparture nap, her arms dangling on either side. She had already eaten her customary breakfast: 17 pounds of bamboo and 150 grams of “leaf eater” biscuits.

Zookeepers soon summoned Bao Bao to the four-by-six-foot enclosure she had grown to know well. To prepare for her send-off, panda keepers had been walking her through it every day, eventually having her stay with the doors closed and adding an occasional honey water spritz to soothe her. On Tuesday, a forklift outfitted with panda ears drove the crate to a truck parked along the main thoroughfare of the zoo.

Mariel Lally, 22, one of the nine full-time panda keepers at the zoo, said she had been working every day beginning at 6:30 a.m. to keep up with preparations for Bao Bao’s departure.

“I think I was the only one who was really sobbing,” she said of the moment Bao Bao disappeared inside the truck. “I had a special thing for Bao just because she was so independent, so fiery and feisty, unlike the other ones. She had her own agenda for things.”

Tuesday’s event at times took the shape of official Washington diplomacy: The Chinese ambassador to the United States, Cui Tiankai, greeted the zoo’s director, Dennis Kelly; announced Beijing’s pride in retaining Bao Bao; and then watched with an entourage as the procession left the zoo grounds. Twin FedEx trucks made up a mini-motorcade, one for Bao Bao and the other a backup in case of a vehicle breakdown.

Panda rearing has become a rare and unusual field of partnership between the United States and China. Years ago, a team of American and Chinese researchers examined the diets and reproductive habits of the pandas, work that led to a fertile period of artificially inseminated baby bears in Chinese breeding centers. Mei Xiang, a female panda lent to the National Zoo in exchange for conservation money and expertise, gave birth to Bao Bao after a long pregnancy gap. The zoo has an agreement with the Chinese conservation association to keep giant pandas through 2020.

“We have a really good relationship with them, and maybe that’s not always the case in other parts of the government,” Ms. Thompson said.

In China, Bao Bao will be quarantined at the Dujiangyan Panda Base for 30 days. She will enter a breeding program when she reaches a sexually mature age, typically between 5 and 6 years old.

“For us, it’s bittersweet, but we also know that every panda that we send to China is adding to the population and is adding to the breeding program, and hopefully some day her offspring will go back into the wild,” Ms. Thompson said. “We’re sending an animal and its genes.”

While Washington may miss her, Bao Bao is certain to find another kind of love: Before a panda-branded FedEx plane whisked Bao Bao away, Mr. Kelly, the zoo director, reassured reporters at Dulles International Airport that in China, Bao Bao will have a boyfriend.