This birthday wish comes a few days late and I apologize dear Mei. Although I did get a chance to post this on flickr, before I could finish my post here, I lost my internet connection. So please forgive me.
So, now with a new modem, we are back in the saddle and it gave me a chance to put together a current video of Mei. I have been watching the National Zoo live webcam to observe Mei while she is experiencing a possible pregnancy or pseudo pregnancy.
Mei was artificially inseminated in the end of March, with Tian Tian's sperm. Tian Tian is her partner that also resides at the National Zoo. Although Mei and Tian were given the opportunity to mate naturally, their efforts were unsuccessful and thus the AI. Here is a photo take by RoxandaBear posted on flickr of Tian and Mei getting together in March of this year.
Here is a compilation of several days webcam captures, showing Mei who has access to her usual indoor area where she will go to eat and rest, but as you will see she frequently enters a smaller room off to the side which she has dedicated as her den area. It is in this small space, similar in size to a hollowed-out tree or cave that a female would choose to have her cub in the wild.
