GERMANY: Berlin's animal park introduces its new jaguar baby Navarino to the public

Berlin's Animal Park proudly showed off its latest addition to the public on Tuesday (October 10). Jaguar baby "Navarino" was born on August 27 and is his mother "Sunshine's" first-born. Navarino's father is called "Natal" and he too is a Berliner, having been born in the animal park 16 years ago. Navarino weighed around a kilo when born, a weigh which he has already quadrupled. Since his birth, Navarino and Sunshine have been kept away from the other animals and the public in the so-called "mother box", but are now ready to move into a normal enclosure where they can be admired by the public. Angelika Berkling, a keeper at the animal park, weighed Navarino and said that they were keeping an eye on his weight to make sure he is gaining weight at the right speed and drinking enough milk. "He's still with his mother, he's still nursing, he's now six weeks old and is still drinking milk. He's now also eating some meat but he'll still for quite a while with his mother," Berkling said. Berkling explained that eventually Navarino will go to another zoo: "we already have two males for breeding and so we can't have another one and also he's related to the females we have here for breeding. So at some point he'll be a breeding male in another zoo and it's great that he'll be able to make sure that more offspring are born," she said. Mid- and South America are the natural habitat of the jaguar. These big cats normally have speckled fur, like Navarino, but as with leopards black jaguars also exist.

ITN Source | October 14, 2006

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