The anteater population in San Francisco just grew by a third. The as-yet-unnamed baby is happy, healthy and is already flicking its tongue at its mother.
The mom is a 2-year-old on loan from the San Diego Zoo. It's her first kid (cub? kitten?). The dad, a 12-year-old named Angelo, and fathered the Zoo's last baby anteater back in 2001.
The baby will clutch to its mom's back for a year.
More details, direct from the Zoo:
Adult anteaters are approximately eight feet long, not including their long, bushy tail. They have slender heads, and are most known for their lengthy, rapidly-moving tongue which is covered with sticky saliva. In the wild, an anteater will claw open an ant mound and feast on approximately 30,000 ants a day. They are capable of flicking their flexible tongue 150 times a minute to capture a mouthful of ants.
