Jaguar babies born in German zoo

Rostock Zoo on Germany’s Baltic Sea coast is celebrating its first jaguar offspring in six years. The cute triplets, which were born on the evening of Dec. 16 and the following morning, are six weeks old and are now on show to the public, according to the zoo’s Web site.

Erwin Sellering, social minister of the state of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, christened the tiny trio last Friday. The black male cub was given the name Keme, which means “secret,” while the black female cub is called Kaya, meaning, appropriately “older sister.” Their speckled sister, who was born on the morning of Dec. 17, several hours after the other two, is called Kachina (“spirit of the invisible life force”). Zoo keepers Ellen Hinz and Andrea Marx chose the names, which come from the Native American languages Algonquin and Hopi.

The three cubs each now weigh around 8.4 pounds (3.8 kilograms), almost three times what they weighed at birth. An adult jaguar can weigh from 100 to 250 pounds (45 to 113 kilograms) and can live 12 to 15 years in the wild.

It is the second time the zoo’s jaguar pair, Blanco und Ayana, have produced offspring. They last had cubs in 2001. Female jaguars normally have litters of one to four cubs

http://www.spiegel.de/international/0,1518,463161,00.html