Hong Kong’s Ying Ying gives birth to twins, becoming oldest first-time giant panda mum
- Ocean Park, which houses the pandas, had kept the pregnancy quiet, with the cubs conceived naturally
Hong Kong has welcomed two baby pandas which were conceived naturally after Ying Ying gave birth to a pair of twins, a male and female, on Thursday morning, becoming the world’s oldest first-time giant panda mum.
She bore her cubs just one day shy of her 19th birthday, equivalent to 57 human years, at her home in Ocean Park, which called the birth of the twins “a true rarity”.
Ying Ying and her partner Le Le succeeded in mating naturally at the park in March. The park had kept her pregnancy a secret throughout the duration, only revealing the news almost 24 hours after her delivery.
“As a first-time mother, Ying Ying was understandably nervous throughout the process. She spent much of her time lying on the ground and twisting,” the park said in a statement late on Thursday.
Ying Ying and Le Le, the second pair of pandas given as a gift by Beijing to the city in 2007, failed to conceive despite several rounds of natural mating since 2011 and an artificial insemination procedure in 2023.
The unexpected news was announced by Chief Executive John Lee Ka-chiu on Thursday night, as he said it was particularly meaningful for the pair to give birth to the twins in the year which marked the 75th anniversary of the People’s Republic of China.
