ZOO staff have been dressing up as pandas to honour their lost bears, after the final four endangered animals at a zoo in Japan were returned to China.
Workers don panda hats at the Adventure World amusement park and zoo in Wakayama where visitors can join a “Panda Love Club”.
For 8,000 yen (£38) visitors can even feed apples to the costumed zookeepers.
It comes after the park’s final four pandas were shipped back to China in June last year.
The bears, 24-year-old Rauhin and her children Yuihin, Saihin and Fuhin, were returned as part of an agreed panda exchange program.
Rauhin made history as the first panda to be born in Japanese captivity.
It’s the end of the park’s 31-year history of hosting the black and white bears.
Soon, Japan will become an entirely panda-free zone, as the country’s final two bears leave Ueno Zoo in Tokyo.
When Rauhin and her offspring left for China, the zoo launched the strange initiative to preserve staff expertise and maintain public interest.
During “Panda Love Club” sessions, visitors pretend to be zookeepers, feeding caged workers.
The park said visitors can “experience a programme that mimics actual animal care work, such as preparing meals, observing behaviour, filling out daily reports and checking the safety of the exercise area”.
The highlight of the 90-minute experience is feeding apple to a costumed zookeeper crouched in the panda’s former cage.
The park said: “This special attraction will allow visitors to learn about the relationship between pandas and care staff … and experience the significance of passing on the lives of giant pandas to the future,” the park said.
In Chinese zoos, it’s the animals who are dressing up.
In February last year, a zoo in Zibo City, Shandong was slammed for painting donkeys black and white to make them look like zebras.
The dodgy dye job was quickly spotted before the zoo admitted the animals were donkeys in disguise.
Another Chinese zoo was mocked when visitors noticed that their pandas were actually painted dogs.
Pics show pooches with black ears, limbs, and dark circles around their eyes – but their canine features are still very much apparent.
Guangyuan Park boasted visitors could see “rare and exotic animals” – and pointed visitors towards the pups.
An aquarium in Shenzhen announced a new whale shark with great fanfare in 2024 – before visitors realised it was actually a robot.
