Polar bear twins to leave Toledo

Associated Press

TOLEDO

Toledo will soon have to say goodbye to its twin polar bears, now nearly 2 years old.

The Toledo Zoo announced Thursday that brother and sister Sakari and Suka, will leave sometime in the fall and move to the Como Park Zoo in St. Paul, Minnesota.

The twins’ parents, Crystal and Marty, will stay behind, along with another female polar bear named Nan, according to The Blade of Toledo.

In all, Toledo’s polar bears have successfully reared eight cubs in the last six years, including Sakari and Suka. The other cubs all have moved, too, to other zoos in Ohio, Missouri and Kentucky.

Cubs are moved to mimic polar-bear behavior in the wild. They’re mostly solitary creatures, and if left together, polar-bear mothers and their offspring could mate.

Sakari and Suka, each currently weighing in at more than 300 pounds, eventually will have to be separated for the same reason.

They were born in November 2012 and named after a naming contest drew hundreds of votes. They went on display for the first time six months later, in May 2013.

Randi Meyerson, assistant director of animal programs at the Toledo Zoo, said that visitors may not have too long to wait before more cubs are born.

She said Nan mated with Marty in the spring. But because polar-bear embryos have a delayed implantation, the zoo won’t know if she is pregnant until the fall.

“We’ve been really fortunate here in Toledo,” Meyerson said. “We’re hopeful we will be again.”