About 9 am last Sunday morning, September 23rd, Mei Xiang honked in distress.

Mei Xiang is a female giant panda who lives at the Smithsonian National Zoo in Washington, D.C. She is 14 years old and she weighs about 216 pounds (100 kilograms). Less than 7 full days before on Sunday night, September 16th, around 10:30 pm, Mei Xiang gave birth to a baby panda cub weighing just 4 ounces (113 grams). Though tiny in size, the little one was surprisingly loud of voice, emitting a high-pitched squeal as it cradled in different positions in its mother’s arms.

A week later, hearing Mei Xiang’s distress call, zoo keepers rushed to help. Nothing could be done, the small panda had stopped breathing and could not be revived. One visitor to the zoo had referred to the baby panda as “a little piece of hope.” And so the little one was, and many mourn the passing.

The giant panda is itself endangered as a species. In the wild, they remain in a few small pockets of bamboo forest in remote mountainous regions near Chengdu, China. They eat the bamboo, and they eat a bunch of bamboo. A munching adults eats 12 hours a day, plucking about 28 pounds of bamboo before drifting off to sleep and dreams of more bamboo in the morning. Only about 1,000 to 2,000 pandas remain in their wild homelands. Zoos around the world offer lodging to about 100 more. In their zoo homes, cubs are few and many do not live long. A newborn is pink, with its eyes closed and no teeth showing. At birth, it is very small, only about the size of a butter stick. The babes need a lot of care. In about a month, the distinctive black and white pattern of the fur and the emerging personality show through. Mei Xiang’s baby never had a chance to show us what she would look like and who she would be.

Mei Xiang has started eating again. She slept Sunday night cradling a small plastic toy. Mei Xiang’s other child, a boy named Tai Shan, is 7-years old. He lives in China. Mom is still young. Pandas can live into their mid-30’s. Mei Xiang and her partner Tian Tian could have another cub. The world is waiting. Let’s hope.

May hope lift your spirit and help us look forward to tomorrow,

Grandpa Jim