US zoo plays matchmaker for pandas

Flying back from California to the District of Columbia, JoGayle Howard carried into the San Diego airport a two foot-tall tank that looked like a metal bomb.

Flying back from California to the District of Columbia, JoGayle Howard carried into the San Diego airport a two foot-tall tank that looked like a metal bomb. Inside, the dry ice gave off a swirl of what looked like smoke.

By the time, she boarded her red-eye flight, flight attendants were cooing over the container, wrapping it in blankets and pillows and asking that any future babies be named after them. Such is the attention to detail afforded by airline workers when they know you’ve just collected and are transporting one of the most valuable commodities in the zoo world: Frozen panda semen.

“The sperm went first-class,” Howard, a National Zoo vet, noted wryly. “I did not.” The sperm flown with such fanfare to Washington last month was for the sole purpose of creating another cub. After meticulous study by animal geneticists, a giant panda from San Diego, with beckoning eyes and unquestioned virility, was deemed the perfect donor for an offspring with the National Zoo’s Mei Xiang.

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In the days since Howard’s return, zoo staffers have been watching Mei Xiang’s hormone levels and looking for the prime moment at which to artificially inseminate her. That necessitates swabbing her urine from the floor. “When she wakes up in the morning, she normally pees, and we take that sample,” Howard said.

Two years ago, artificial insemination using sperm from Tian Tian, Mei Xiang’s male partner at the zoo, resulted in the birth of Tai Shan. This time, if all goes as planned, the father will be the hearty Gao Gao (pronounced Gow Gow), pride of the San Diego Zoo, a giant panda whose promotional glossies show him to possess the liquid eyes of a Johnny Depp and the sultry mystery of an Antonio Banderas. Tian Tian, in comparison, is kind of a Danny DeVito meets Michael Dukakis, a somewhat dopey but sweetly earnest guy who seems to inhabit the wonky culture of his adopted Washington home. Even in Pandaland, it seems, hunky heartthrobs win.

Zoo officials have two days—the equivalent of one swift weekend during the entirety of 2007—in which to get this right. Mei Xiang should hit her peak fertility sometime later this month, or at some point in April.