Baby panda twins greet first visitors in Berlin

BERLIN - Zoo Berlin's newest residents, a pair of panda sisters born in late August, made their long-awaited debut to press on Tuesday and will welcome the public starting Wednesday.

The newborn cubs spent their first few weeks behind the scenes. Starting Wednesday, however, visitors will have the chance to watch them grow and explore.

Andreas Knieriem, director of the zoo and Tierpark, said only the panda cubs will be visible to the public, while their mother, Meng Meng, will remain behind the scenes. The cubs will be housed in a specially designed glass enclosure with an advanced air filtration system to keep them safe from external elements.

One cub will be on display at a time, for an hour each day, from 1:30 pm to 2:30 pm local time at the zoo's "Panda Garden", while the other stays with their mother, said Florian Sicks, a biologist and panda curator. "We will observe closely how the little pandas react to their new environment and adjust the time window, if necessary."

Sicks said the two cubs are "developing wonderfully". The twins, weighing just 150 grams each at birth, have grown to 2.5 kilograms at 55 days old -- 15 times their birth weight. "They're growing so quickly that if you don't see them for just a day, it feels like they've grown even more."

He said two colleagues from the Chengdu Research Base of Giant Panda Breeding in China, where the 11-year-old Meng Meng originally comes from, are currently on site in Berlin to assist with cub care and breeding.

"They've done an outstanding job, and we are extremely grateful for their support," Sicks said, expressing appreciation for the program. "Our collaboration is incredibly good, and we look forward to even deeper partnerships in the future."

The new twin cubs were born after an artificial insemination procedure on March 26, following intensive observation and careful preparation by an international team of experts. Their names are yet to be decided, as it is a tradition to name the panda cubs after their first 100 days of life.

Zoo Berlin aims to raise public awareness about nature conservation through the appeal of these "adorable, beady-eyed" bears, who will help highlight the importance of protecting endangered species and their habitats, Knieriem said.

Meng Meng arrived from China in 2017. In August 2019, she gave birth to the first-ever twin panda cubs in Germany, Meng Xiang and Meng Yuan.