A Sun Bears Couple Is Excited About New Home | The Secret Life of the Zoo | Nature Bites

[Music] at the Malayan sunbear habitat Keepers need to get lifelong Partners Tony and Millie breeding again Tony and Millie aren't quite so lovey-dovey I guess there's definitely not a happy couple going on there at the moment [Music] Tony is such a sweet little bear he tries so hard to please Millie and she doesn't always appreciate it [Music] she's the smaller of the two but she definitely wears the trousers Tony is now 11 um and they've been together since they were rescued in Cambodia seven years ago their relationship I guess it's very hot and cold when it's hot it's really hot but at the moment it's cold there's no mating going on [Music] last year with breeding Tony and Millie but after Millie gave birth celebrations were cruelly cut short the Cub was born in January one night but then sadly it died the next day but she carried on looking after it in the nest wouldn't she come to terms with the fact that he had died eventually she did move away from it and we were able to go and retrieve it [Music] was the baby passed away the couple have not always been getting on [Music] we do see Millie getting quite annoyed at Tony some of the time it really depends on how she's feeling as to whether or not she's gonna take his advances but with as few as a thousand sun bears remaining in the wild it's vital Millie is encouraged to try for another cup some relationships develop and Blossom by themselves but sometimes you do have to give them a little bit of a help in hand with romance on the Rocks keepers are preparing to move the couple to a brand new bear love nest I think it's going to give us good foraging areas part of the job for the Bears is playing Cupid we're not going to play romantic music and Scatter rose petals around but we just have to make sure that it's the right environment for them as close to Natural as we possibly can if all goes to plan Millie should warm to Tony again we hope she can start afresh and have her Cubs in there and it'll all be great it's 2 p.m the transfer of estranged sun bears Millie and Tony to a brand new habitat begins this afternoon it's critical that the move goes well as Chester is hoping to become the first British Zoo to breed this rare species breeding of some bears actually is a bit of a mystery people don't know a huge amount about it and there's not much of it happening in captivity around the world [Music] we really hope that it will provide a great environment for breeding success but moving an 80 kilo carnivore is a challenge bears are not easy to move in sense that you can't just go in and shove them into a crate with a broom or net them or anything they're way too powerful and strong for that and we really want to avoid sedating them because that can have many risks to make this operation even trickier being put in a Transit crate brings back bad memories for Tony and Millie their moms were killed by poachers so when they were tiny Cubs they were sold into the illegal pet trade so they're not exactly keen on going into crates and you can understand why Tony is first to be transferred and the team are expecting him to be particularly wary he's been through an awful lot of trauma caused by humans he's had his four canine teeth removed which has pulled out of his mouth with no anesthetic or anything when he was a tiny cook which is why we we take things very slow with Tony yeah it's fine sure keeper Lucy has a solution that she thinks may help the best way to persuade a bear is food but particularly honey they don't want to enter a crate but they're willing to do it for a nice reward and that's honey in the wild sun bears risk stinging their 20 centimeter long tongue to raid beehives but today the honey is served we have to go one step at a time and each step involves a blob of honey foreign keeper Lucy squeezes honey through the gate at the far end to tempt Tony into the crate good boy you just got to get him into that sort of Honey zombie face good lads honey good lads ready Dana go go go go good boy Tony good boy Johnny came into the crate for honey but then his honey High ended at that point it's just go go go get him to the new enclosure [Music] oh [Music] [Music] with the short journey across the zoo complete Tony takes his first steps in his new home after a brief review of the territory time for another nap foreign and he's already making it his own so we've now got to go and get Millie hopefully it will go as well as Tony [Music] sun bear Tony is settling well into his new home he's really loving the new habitat he spends loads of time up the trees and he lies right in front of the windows having a nap snoring away [Music] Old Flame Millie has also made the move but they've been kept in separate areas [Music] today they're about to be reunited time to go meet Tony again the Bears have never produced a surviving Cub together you do sometimes think it's never going to happen but then she had the club in January which and I didn't survive but it has given us hope keepers are banking on their new love Den to make all the difference we really want them to get on really well relationship to Blossom and hopefully that'll be the place to start a family have fun here she goes [Music] as Millie makes her appearance Tony goes all out to impress [Music] you can see how ripped he is he's just showing off um I'd be impressed if I put that much effort in at the gym I think mating has always been on Millie's terms and in their old home Tony was getting the cold shoulder oh but it seems Tony's flirting is starting to melt Millie's heart courtship has started and it's in full swing there's lots of hugging and fondling [Music] this is all part of the courtship Behavior then wrestling and playing and there's a lot of neck biting a bit of a headlock there it's all part of it [Music] the love bears are becoming Inseparable whether they're dining out together it's all part of courtship I guess taking her out for dinner or heading back inside for Afters [Music] I think they see this as their bedroom it's like a king-sized Suite it definitely seems to have set the mood the mood seems to have taken both of them and they're not shy in showing it they chose to do most of their meeting right in front of the huge new viewing windows just staring at them I'll lead them to it and we're so want Millie to have a cup not only could we learn a massive amount about it but also we can then use that in the wild to help save the species to have a little Club in the new enclosure as well would kind of be the icing on the cake who doesn't want to see a bear cub you know so fingers crossed foreign [Music]

Channel: Nature Bites

Views: 29,926

Keywords: Nature Bites, animal interaction, animal kingdom secrets, beauty of nature, bond between animals, charming wildlife, cuddly animals, cute bears, exotic animals, natural habitats, natural surroundings, natural world, nature series, sun bear habitat, thrilling chapter, wild adventures, wildlife adventures, wildlife observation, wildlife relationships, wildlife wonders, zoo life moments

Id: 5LRfRlwuPdg

Length: 10min 26sec (626 seconds)

Published: Sat Jun 17 2023