Red panda returns to the Louisville Zoo for first time in nearly 40 years

In an enclosure with a few trees, some greenery and a carpet of woodchips is where for the first time in nearly 40 years Louisville Zoo visitors will find a small animal from South and Southeast Asia peeping its pointed ears out of a hollow log.

Sundara is a one-year-old male red panda that was moved to Louisville from the Kansas City Zoo, along with handler Jessica Cunningham. He's been in Louisville for just a few weeks, said Dan Maloney, zoo director, and he's settling into his new home.

"We are very excited to have red pandas back at the Zoo and to be sharing this species with Kentuckiana," Maloney said in a release from the zoo.

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Cunningham, assistant animal curator, has worked with Sundara, said to mean "beautiful" in Sanskrit, for a little more than a month. Their paths only crossed a few times in Kansas City, Missouri, but Cunningham knows Sunny D. − as the red panda is called − better than most people. His personality, she said, is "bold" and "courageous."

"He's not usually scared of things," she added.

Cunningham said Sunny D. is trained to do some specific movements, including climbing onto a scale so he can be weighed while he's still growing − red pandas are fully grown around two. Teaching him to touch his nose to a target also helps keepers encourage the red panda to come to them when he needs a check-in.

Sundara's training is meant to help acclimate him to the new environment, Cunningham said. In the wild, red pandas are solitary, tree-dwelling and crepuscular − active at dusk and dawn − the release said. In the wild, though, the animal can be lazy in order to conserve energy, sleeping for up to 17 hours a day.

"Being around humans is not very common at all," she said. "They probably wouldn't be very comfortable around people. Even with other animals, they only see each other during breeding season or rearing their young."

Sundara was born in captivity, but a red panda's natural environment is found in Himalayan forests from Nepal to Southern China. Their numbers are decreasing, and the animal is listed as endangered on the International Union for Conservation of Nature's Red List, a database of vulnerable animals. The exact population is hard to know, Maloney said, because they live in high-altitude areas in dense forests.

Residential and commercial development, mining and quarrying, logging and tourism are among the many threats to their environment, according to the conservation union.

Sundara officially turns a year old this month and the zoo plans on celebrating his birthday by feeding him plenty of treats.

Visitors can see Sunny D. at the Glacier Run exhibit in the former snowy owl enclosure next to Splash Park.

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The Louisville Zoo, 1100 Trevilian Way, is the top non-profit, paid attraction in the state, the release said. The zoo is "dedicated to bettering the bond between people and our planet by providing excellent care for animals, a great experience for visitors, and leadership in scientific research and conservation education." It's accredited by the Association of Zoos and Aquariums and exhibits more than 1,100 animals on 130 acres and represents many different ecosystems, the organization's website said.

Contact reporter Rae Johnson at RNJohnson@gannett.com. Follow them on Twitter at @RaeJ_33.

This article originally appeared on Louisville Courier Journal: Meet Sundara: One-year-old red panda and newest addition to the Louisville Zoo in decades