Celina Tu updates us on her first few weeks as a PDXWildlife intern-

Well, it’s been a bit more than two weeks here in Ya’an and the apartment is finally starting to feel like home (although the six flights of stairs up to it is not getting easier). We are already making local friends here – they all smile and wave at us as we walk down the street every morning and evening coming to and from the bus stop to work. The best part of coming home is saying hello to this little girl (we call her “Mei Mei, meaning little girl) who lives right downstairs at the apartment complex. She has a smile that brightens up even the rainiest of days here in this small but bustling town. The other two interns – Scout and Sofany – are silliest and funniest and we make a pretty dynamic trio. I think we’re already best friends…

Wen Yu and Celina studying each other

Things up at the panda base are becoming familiar routine as well. To explain things simply, we are collecting raw data (maternal behavior scores, stereotypical behavior scores, and male fecal samples) for three sets of studies. Maternal scores are collected to further understand development of maternal care styles and effects of cross fostering when the mother gives birth to twins. As always with captive animals, we are also collecting stereotypical scores to examine factors affecting stress management and welfare in the Giant Panda. Lastly, we are collecting male fecal specimens in order to create a baseline hormone analysis to compare to levels of hormones during the breeding season.

We have all assigned ourselves bears to observe, here are mine: Maternal care: Mei Xi (twins!) and Cui Cui. Stereotypical: Lin Bing, Ying Hua, Yang Yang, Le Sheng, Cui Cui, Qian Qian, You You, Duo Duo, and Wu Gang.

So far I have only gotten to observe Mei Xi for maternal care and Ying Hua for stereotypical. Mei Xi is such a good mommy! Her little cub (the younger of the two twins) is definitely high maintenance – she barely let’s her mom sleep with all her squawking and squirming!