The fifth-oldest male panda in the world passed away at the end of April.
Ling Ling was Japan’s oldest giant panda. He was born at China’s Beijing Zoo in 1985 and was given to Japan as a symbol of friendship in 1992. Ling Ling was a star attraction at Tokyo’s Ueno Zoo for more than fifteen years. This is the first time in a long time that Ueno Zoo has not had a giant panda in residence — Ling Ling’s predecessors arrived from China to commemorate the signing of a peace treaty between China and Japan in 1972. The Ueno Zoo always had a giant panda… until now.
Last August, Ling Ling began losing his appetite and strength. Keepers believed this was simply due to his advanced age. More recently, Ling Ling suffered from heart and kidney problems. A day before he died, Ling Ling was withdrawn from public view because of his health issues.
The chief panda keeper at Ueno Zoo called Ling Ling “a darling” and told the Associated Press that losing the giant panda broke his heart. The zoo is currently displaying a portrait of the panda in his cage, along with bouquets and offerings of bamboo shoots from mourners.
When he passed away from heart failure, Ling Ling was twenty-two and a half years old — approximately seventy in human years. He was the only giant panda owned by Japan; the others in the country are on loan from China. Ueno Zoo and the Japanese Prime Minister are hoping that China will loan or gift another giant panda to Tokyo.
In recent years, Ling Ling made three trips to Mexico to mate with other giant pandas. All three attempts were unsuccessful. Only around sixteen hundred giant pandas live in the wild in China; these giant animals are quite rare.
(By the way, this isn’t the same Ling Ling that used to live in Washington, D.C.)