Four Chinese pandas to be moved to Calgary after 5 years in Toronto

The four pandas will live at the Calgary Zoo (Pixabay photo)

TORONTO — Today is the latest chance to see the giant pandas at the Toronto Zoo before the bears head west to Calgary.

Two of the pandas — Da Mao and Er Shun — arrived at the zoo on loan from China in 2013 as part of a global giant panda conservation breeding program,

Their cubs — Jia Panpan and Jia Yueyue — were the first giant pandas to be born in Canada.

The four pandas will live at the Calgary Zoo until 2023 in “Panda Passage,” a newly-constructed habitat.

The Toronto Zoo says the conservation breeding program has met with some success over the past five years, with the giant panda being downgraded in 2016 from “endangered” to “vulnerable” by the International Union for Conservation of Nature.