If you’re a fan of the Woodland Park Zoo‘s pair of now nearly two-year-old snow leopard cubs, hie thee to the zoo posthaste, as it’s the last few days to see the family together. The male, Gobi, is moving April 7th to Rolling Hills Wildlife Adventure in Salina, Kansas. Hope he likes Applebee’s. To make matters worse, his sister Batu is leaving Seattle as well, off to Assiniboine Zoo in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada. Hope she likes…ummm…Guy Maddin films?
As you may recall, Gobi and Batu were born on Memorial Day in 2009. The siblings are the first and only offspring for parents Helen and Tom, so they’re going to be empty nesting pretty hard. But with the kids away, they can focus on themselves more, reinvigorate their marriage, travel, maybe take up painting. You know, snow leopard stuff.
To be sure, the juvenile snow leopards are moving under the recommendation of the snow leopard Species Survival Plan, a cooperative breeding program to ensure genetic diversity and healthy populations in North American zoos and aquariums. And yes, the departure of the snow leopards follows the natural course of young snow leopards living in the wild, who typically leave their mothers when they’re approximately eighteen months old. But that doesn’t mean I have to like it. So long, kitties. Travel back in time with this video to the cubs’ first public checkup, when they were just a month old:
