Another polar cub steps out
2008-04-16 21:30
Stuttgart - German polar bear fans have another star to visit.
Stuttgart's Wilhelma zoo presented 4-month-old Wilbaer to the public on Wednesday, bringing the fluffy cub outdoors alongside his mother, Corinna.
Wilbaer made his debut just a week after the Nuremberg zoo presented its female cub, Flocke, who has been hand-raised since her mother was seen tossing the cub around her enclosure in January.
No such worries for Wilbaer, who initially stuck close by his mother when he emerged on Wednesday.
The cub sniffed at rocks and tentatively stuck his front paws in the water, before eventually following his mother's lead and diving in.
Wilbaer was born on December 10, a day before Flocke. However, the zoo only announced his birth at the end of February, citing the media frenzy that surrounded the Berlin zoo's hand-raised polar bear cub Knut last year as its reason for keeping the arrival under wraps at first.
Still, zoo officials say they have had his name - a combination of the zoo's name and the German word for bear, "baer" - registered as a trademark.
- AP