Baby twin pandas debuted in Japan (VIDEO)
| Boston
What's cuter than a baby panda? Two of them.
Japan's newest giant pandas, who were born on Aug. 11, made their media debut on Sept. 3 to the delight of many.
The brother and sister, who have quadrupled their birth weight, now measuring in at a hefty 1.5 pounds, have recently developed their black and white color pattern. They still remain nameless, however. Panda cubs are traditionally not named until they are 100 days old.
And yeah, baby pandas are definitely not that cute when they're born. They are tiny, pink, blind, and toothless. The cub won't crawl until 75 to 80 days after birth.
The swaddled baby twin pandas in Japan were put in an incubator and did manage to do some cute bobbing and weaving.
These two wee ones are lucky to have been born at Wakayama Adventure World. Baby pandas are rare, and twin baby pandas even more so.
In the wild, if twin baby pandas are born, the mother will select the stronger of the cubs, and the weaker will die. Some scientists suspect that the mother cannot produce enough milk for two cubs in the wild.
But there is no doubt that the twins will be the darlings of Japan's animal world for a while. Until the twins were born, Japan only had 10 pandas in captivity.
And these twins were conceived naturally rather than by artificial insemination, a note-worthy fact because members of this endangered species often struggled with successful reproduction on their own in captivity.
And with an estimated 1,600 pandas living in the wild, and about 210 pandas in captivity, reproduction is a serious business. Pandas are FedExed around the world for the purpose of entering breeding programs.
Tai Shan, a giant panda born at the National Zoo in Washington, flew to China via FedEx in February with another giant panda from Zoo Atlanta.
We can only hope that Wakayama Adventure World installs a panda cam, much like the San Diego Zoo's.
And remember the adorable hilarity of the sneezing panda cub from 2006 that went viral?
What's cuter than one sneezing panda cub? Brace yourself.
