By MICHAEL ZENNIE
...She said she found milk in the cub's digestive tract, (click here) meaning she had been successfully nursing from her mother before her death.
'We’d all felt that Mei Xiang had been a very good mother and had been very gentle with the cub, and indeed, that turns out to be the case,' Dr Murray said.
The seasoned animal surgeon, and mother of three, nearly broke down as she described the dead newborn.
'The cub was just beautiful. Beautiful little body. Beautiful face, with the markings just beginning to show around the eye. Couldn’t have been more beautiful,' she said.
The tragedy is a familiar one for the National Zoo. Out of eight giant panda cubs born since the zoo began its breeding program in the 1970s, only one has survived to maturity.
The rest died within a few days of being born....
