Summary
A baby red panda named Roxie at the Royal Zoological Society of Scotland died from “stress caused by fireworks” after choking on her vomit, just days after her mother’s sudden death.
The incident, occurring around the U.K.’s Bonfire Night celebrations, has led to renewed calls for stricter fireworks regulations.
A petition with over a million signatures urging restrictions on public fireworks sales was submitted to the U.K. government.
Edinburgh recently implemented limited fireworks control zones, but animal welfare advocates argue for broader measures to prevent similar tragedies.
"Veterinary experts at the Royal Zoological Society of Scotland announced on Wednesday that a 3-month-old panda named Roxie died “due to stress caused by fireworks being let off across the city centre.”
Go on guys teach those no good experts how to do their jobs!
I feel the need to put the /s tag seeing the comments in this topic.
A lot of people in the comment here are being pretty obtuse, I’m doubtful many are even from the UK and understand the scale of celebrations with Guy Fawks and Divali being so close together this year
We’re super cute, so you’d expect that people would want to keep us around, but our existence is still endangered. Please don’t scare us to death.
Signed:
- A fuzzy red panda
Hey, if your country is overrun by red panda infestations, you know exactly what to do!
Die from cuteness overload?
No! Fireworks! 🎇🎆🎇🎇🎆. Just pop a whole bunch and your panda problems would be history. C’mon man 😂. We can save the world! From red pandas
Plz no. We are so cute. 🥺
but… I don’t want to save the world from red pandas.
I want to leave, and dying from cuteness overload sounds like not such a bad way to go.
Let me tell you the story of the great Knocrates. He was a Greek philosophy major from ancient UCLA. He really liked cute things and one day he was between two of the most beautiful tits women kind had ever grown. Look the point is that you probably don’t want cute 🥺🥰. It doesn’t last. Anyway you want Hot 🥵🔥🥵. You want 🔥!
You don’t hear about a great red panda browser. But you hear about Firefox a lot! See what I mean? So fireworks 🎆🎇🎇 it is!
Says it was the “fireworks causing stress” that killed it not imprisoning a wild animal in a foreign environment. I am having a hard time blaming the fireworks here.
I’m dubious. Mom dies suddenly, then baby dies suddenly after choking on it’s own vomit. Yeah, no, let’s blame the fireworks. Surely, nothing else could be the cause of Red Panda deaths at this zoo.
Maybe they should have called some vet experts to investigate. Oh wait that is exactly what they did but I am sure people on the internets know more about animals. Not a big fan of zoos but people who armchair are magnitudes worse.
I had a whole thing earlier but was mistaken, the baby was 3 months old not a newborn. Either way, I still don’t doubt that fireworks could easily stress out a very young animal and be the tipping point of their health.
I’m not sure what could motivate them to make a grand conspiracy against fireworks, rather than the more likely result of them being exhausted and frustrated caretakers who, like any pet owner, probably spent that evening trying to calm the panda down only to watch it panic until it died. Stress vomiting isn’t really rare for animals on the 4th of July. It’s just the extreme end of stress.
I’m not saying that it’s a conspiracy against fireworks, but possibly a problem with the habitat, food, or something else that would cause big issues for the zoo if discovered. The fireworks were convenient. I have zero evidence for this other than the fact that a lot of zoos are complete cesspools, and so I typically don’t trust “suddenly died” followed three days later by another “suddenly died” regardless of how many fireworks were launched off.
Also, there is this line:
Roxie had access to her den but the frightening noises seem to have been too much for her.
Seems like the zoo just left a weak animal to suffer instead of taking precautions to assure that the panda was placed in a safe location. It makes me doubt that anyone was even there, and that the zookeepers returned the following day to a dead red panda and tried to cover it up.
“I have zero evidence for this…”
Says it all really.
Tell me, what was the purpose of your comment? What are you trying to say?
That’s fair, I definitely jumped to the “they wanna take away fireworks” conspiracy on my end, too much arguing on the Internet for me this week >.<
I do hope they look into it. I just know how freaked out my pets have been in the past, inconsolable at times, so the fireworks being a real factor wouldn’t surprise me. I’d hope they would have meds to help calm the animals, but I wonder if they were too young for them, or had a dosage issue.
Whether or not it was the direct cause in this case, fireworks cause a lot of animals a lot of stress and deaths do come from it.
I don’t see why anyone needs to be able to buy explosives to use at home, firework shows should be organised in set locations and should use low noise fireworks as much as possible.
I mean, if you’ve ever had a pet during the 4th of July you know stress responses range from hiding and being generally skittish to literally stress vomiting or running around the house in a panic. That kind of stress for a newborn animal just a few days old could quite easily kill it.
As for the mom, who just gave birth, a very risky thing for most animals…
Look I’m not saying it’s impossible but what’s more likely. An animal died after giving birth (common) and the newborn panda died during a very stressful event while it didn’t have a mother so was likely even more stressed? Fireworks probably just exacerbated a terrible situation for the baby.
Or some grand conspiracy by all the employees of the place to cover up, checks notes red panda deaths, and, checks notes again wage war on the fireworks industry?
It’s likely the caretakers had been fighting to keep the baby alive for days after its mother died, and fireworks happened noticeably stressing out the fragile panda even more, and they were incredibly sad and angry that something as stupid as fireworks was the tipping point for the life of this baby animal.
😭
So susceptible to stres. Zoos often lack enough cover and “hide away” spots for them. Poor thing
Man, people really do love their fireworks… Noise, light and pollution, Yay!
I wonder how many of you guys complain about cars for the same reasons…
People can get really defensive and hostile about fireworks and I’ve never really understood it.
I quit smoking at the beginning of this summer because it’s a terrible habit that’s inconsiderate to others at best(and bad for me too). So I quit. The thing is I actually liked smoking…Nicotine is something else(I used nicotine gum for anyone wondering)
So if I can accept that about smoking, why is it so hard for folks to understand that fireworks, while enjoyable, can have detrimental effects to other living creatures nearby? Some of whom might be people? It’s just really strange to me.
Over here, it’s pretty rare to have a car that causes a lot of noise.
A few days ago, there was a car crossing me that was quieter than my cycle’s hub. And it was an ICE.
Only the “sports” cars and bikes tend to be loud and thanks to petroleum prices (and the vehicle’s price itself) are much less in number.But loudspeakers and fireworks, I cannot bear.
Air pollution? Mine is a smoker’s country. People like me are lucky not to be handed the Darwin award.
Don’t forget the fires and injuries!
That’s sad. Why are they selling baby red pandas?
Hold my flashbang, I’m going in!
they can’t eat all of them before the best before date
Sale of Fireworks
Fireworks and red pandas have both existed at the same time for hundreds of years. Red pandas first discovered in 1825 by a French zoologist. One would assume it didn’t just blink into existence (however, I can’t prove it). Fireworks came about around 200 BC.
One would presume that there’s been a lot of overlap.
It’s possible the fireworks exacerbated a problem but it’s not the root cause.
I’m glad to hear these little red dudes aren’t extinct yet, tbh.
Me too.
Why can’t they put them in a sound safe zone till the fireworks dissipate? This zoo is incompetent and should be investigated
Because a lot of idiots keep shooting fireworks even though the day they’re supposed to be used on has not yet come or has long passed. Here, they’re supposed for New Year’s Eve. The first one this autumn went off sometime in September. The last one usually goes off sometime in February. What are the zookeepers supposed to do?
Or, maybe fireworks should just not be a thing.
