"Belgium's pandas fail to be intimate at the right time"
Carers at the animal park have made every effort to ensure that the two pandas could be intimate during the few fleeting moments when a baby panda can be conceived. This happened on two occasions, last weekend and on Monday. Pairi Daiza's Facebook pages note that Hao Hao and Xing Hui were together at the right moment, but intimacy was not forthcoming.
"Xing Hui has shown interest in the female, but did not display enough dominance and maturity to take action."
That is a bit of a disappointment as the mating widow for giant pandas is only open twelve hours a year. At Pairi Daiza they are not letting their spirits drop. A vet is quoted as saying: "What we witnessed this year is full of promise. Hao Hao is ready."
"The two pandas have a good relationship. They show a lot of interest in each other and that is not always the case when man meets woman. Add another year of sexual maturity and we believe chances of mating will be considerably higher."
