And on Nov. 28, when Dr. Lucy Spelman, chief veterinarian at the National Zoo in Washington, D.C., gave a lethal injection to Hsing-Hsing the giant panda, 28—equivalent to 80 or 90 in human years—and in failing health, it was as if a family member had died. "It's very hard to go to the Panda House," says Lisa Stevens, associate curator of mammals. "We can still smell his presence; he was a special animal."
Hsing-Hsing and his companion, Ling-Ling, came to this country in April 1972 as a gift from the People's Republic of China in honor of President Richard M. Nixon's historic visit there that February. The rare and beautiful bearlike animals were an instant hit, drawing as many as 20,000 visitors a day.
After keepers made several unsuccessful attempts to get Hsing-Hsing and Ling-Ling to mate—and were frustrated by Hsing-Hsing's inability to get the idea—the two produced a cub in July 1983, only to see it die of pneumonia within three hours. Four more cubs were born, but all died quickly, and Ling-Ling succumbed to heart failure in 1992.
Hsing-Hsing, who survived an eye infection in 1993 and cancer in 1997, was diagnosed in May with kidney failure. "The last three or four days," says Stevens, "it took quite an effort for him to do basic things, like eat or move around. We knew it was time."
Saved by the Bell Reunion
The hookups, the meltdowns, the memoires
The case reveals what was really going on what they think of each other now!
