The six-month-old polar bears are real crowd favorites, as their growth is closely followed by many. That is why the zoo staff asked bear fans on social media to suggest names for the cubs, from which the keepers chose the ones they liked best.
The request was that the name should be suitable for a mature, commanding animal and have two syllables for future polar bear training.
Thousands of suggestions were received, including some very appealing ones such as Nanok, Siku, and Bjorn, but in the end, two names were chosen that refer to movie characters, as the little ones are real stars.
Their names are Ootek and Jorek. As Ootek was the first polar bear in our park, this name combination is particularly dear to us.
The Nyíregyháza Zoo currently has five polar bears in its Interactive Ice World exhibition. The 11-year-old mother, Sznyezsána, lives with her cubs, while the adult males, 25-year-old Lloyd and 11-year-old Fiete, live separately in their own enclosures, as only the mother is responsible for raising the young.
The cubs are growing at record speed. At birth, they weighed only 0.6-1 kg, but now they weigh around 40 kg.
Although their main food is still their mother's milk, they are already eating solid food.
According to the literature, they will definitely suckle until they are 1 year old, but the fat content of their mother's milk, which is currently 32%, gradually decreases. By the time the cubs are 12 months old, it will be 18%.
The polar bear mother raises her cubs until they are two years old, after which, as they are the offspring of animals that arrived in the species conservation program (EEP), they will be transferred to other zoos on the recommendation of the species coordinator.
The godparents are also fitting for the namesakes: Jorek's godfather is Dr. Ferenc Kovács, mayor of Nyíregyháza, while Ooteké's godfather is Csaba Tóth, HR director of the LEGO factory in Nyíregyháza.
As helping wild animals is also an important mission for us, during the ceremony László Gajdos, director of the Nyíregyháza Zoo, announced that this year, anyone who symbolically adopts a baby polar bear will have a plaque placed at the polar bear enclosure, and the adoption fee will be donated to Polar Bears International.
