Red panda brothers make their debut at the Minnesota Zoo

NINA MOINI: Well, let's switch gears to a rather fluffy topic. I'm talking about red pandas. They're wildly popular at zoos around the world, and in their home region in forests across Asia. Over the weekend, two panda brothers made their debut at the Minnesota Zoo for the summer. It's been four years since the zoo has hosted red pandas, and they're joining a new exhibit focused on the forests of China. Randy Kochevar has been working hard to set up that exhibit, and he's on the line to explain how it came together. Thanks for being here, Randy.

RANDY KOCHEVAR: My pleasure. Thank you for having me.

NINA MOINI: Well, I feel like you have a fun job, I have to say. You put a lot of work into getting the red pandas back to the Minnesota Zoo. What does it take to get them back into the zoo?

RANDY KOCHEVAR: Well, it starts with creating a habitat, and so what we needed to do is to create a place where they can live that mimics the place that they come from, the bamboo forests of China. So our team, our animal care team, our construction team, and our horticulture team worked together to create a habitat that will be welcoming for them, and that we can put them in with other animals from that same habitat, the cranes and the deer that live with them. So it's been a labor of love for months and months, getting that planned and put together.

NINA MOINI: That's what I thought. You probably can't do that in a week. Are you waiting for things to become its own ecosystem in there, or at what point do you say, all right, we can welcome the pandas?

RANDY KOCHEVAR: Well, it's a bit of that, and then it's also just the complications of doing construction. Anybody that's done a remodel on their house knows how that goes, so everything takes longer than you think. And then once we have everything in place, it's getting the animals comfortable, getting them introduced, getting them acclimated to that habitat, so that when our visitors see them they're doing the kinds of things that they would do in nature. And all of that takes time.

NINA MOINI: Yeah. And so it's not just red pandas, then, that people would see in that habitat. What are the other animals and things people could expect to see?

RANDY KOCHEVAR: Yeah, there are two other species that we have in the habitat with them, so one are the northern tufted deer. These are these little miniature deer. They're maybe the size of a yellow Lab or something like that. Instead of having antlers, the males have little fangs like a vampire, so they're adorable.

And then we also have red-crowned cranes, which if you've-- these are the national birds of Japan. If you've ever seen art from Japan and there are those beautiful cranes in that art, we have two red-crowned cranes in the exhibit. They are spectacular animals. They stand about four and a half feet tall, and they are just really beautiful and really graceful. It was so much fun to see them released into the habitat and watching them start to explore.

NINA MOINI: What does it look like once they're comfortable in there? I mean, are they laying around a lot? Or what are the red pandas up to, I guess, all day?

[LAUGHTER]

RANDY KOCHEVAR: Well, for both for the cranes and the deer, it's watching them do the kinds of things that you would see them do in nature. So the cranes are going around and scratching at the dirt and finding things to eat, and the deer are walking around, keeping their eye on the cranes, finding places to bed down and be comfortable.

The pandas tend to climb up to the highest place they can find, and just hang out in the trees. We've provided them with fresh bamboo cuttings so they have the kinds of food that they like to eat. And we are working with them gradually to get them more and more comfortable being in that habitat out in front of our visitors.

NINA MOINI: Yeah. Do you think that pandas, or red pandas, are pretty popular with zoo visitors? Is it pretty high up there?

RANDY KOCHEVAR: Yeah, we had red pandas at the Minnesota Zoo from 1978 to 2018 and we found them consistently to be one of the very most popular animals that we've ever displayed. So we were really excited to have an opportunity to bring them back into our collection in a brand-new habitat, displaying them outside, and putting them in a place that looks very much like the forest that they come from in nature.

NINA MOINI: And these two little guys, brothers, that are coming here, what makes them special?

RANDY KOCHEVAR: Well, these two are actually brothers. Their names are Cedar and Spruce. They're a pair from a set of triplets that were born in Lincoln Children's Zoo. So these are young guys, they're just a few months old, so they have a nice long life ahead of them. And they are just like puppies or anything else. They're very playful, very inquisitive, and just adorable. They are so cute. They're just the most adorable animals.

NINA MOINI: I love that. And I know you know that it's also about conservation and the fact that these red pandas need help. How endangered are they?

RANDY KOCHEVAR: You know, reports vary. I mean, these are considered endangered species. We know that there are less than 10,000 of them in nature. Some estimates have them as low as 2,500 individuals. So these are animals that are very endangered, and one of the roles that we can play at the zoo is providing a population in captivity that are genetically diverse, and we can continue to breed them.

We can also continue to support wild conservation efforts. So for example, we are involved with a SAFE program. We're involved with the Red Panda Network, which has planted more than 643,000 trees in the area to help restore the habitat that these red pandas live in, so that we can help that population to recover.

NINA MOINI: Yeah, so lots of efforts going on there. So these pandas, how long are they with Minnesota Zoo? Is it for the entirety of their lifetime, or how does that work?

RANDY KOCHEVAR: That's a great question. So the lifespan of red pandas tends to be around 10 years. One of these pandas is in our collection. One of them is on loan to us. And like all zoos and aquariums that are a part of the Zoo Association, we work with other zoos and aquariums across the nation and around the world. So we may have opportunities to bring in females so that we can breed them. We may be loaning our males out to other zoos so that they can breed them.

So what actually happens from here with these animals, we'll just have to wait and see. I mean, our intention would be that we will always have animals on display, but we will also be collaborating with other zoos to make sure that we can continue sustaining this population and sustaining a genetically diverse population in zoos across the country.

NINA MOINI: Randy, thank you very much for stopping by Minnesota Now. How exciting, red pandas! Thank you. [LAUGHS]

RANDY KOCHEVAR: My pleasure. I hope you come by and see them.

NINA MOINI: I will, thanks. That was Randy Kochevar, chief animal care, health, conservation, and behavior officer at the Minnesota Zoo.