NEWS - AGING GORILLASTIFLES LONLINESS WITH ZOO'S GIFT OF A PET BUNNY NAMED 'PANDA'

Aging gorilla stifles loneliness with zoo's gift of a pet bunny named 'Panda'

By Daily Mail Reporter
PUBLISHED: 18:49 EST, 9 March 2012

An elderly gorilla at a Pennsylvania zoo has a new companion: a bunny named Panda.
The Erie Zoo's gorilla, Samantha, has been without a full-time friend since the death of Rudy, a male gorilla, in 2005.
But officials say the 47-year-old western lowland gorilla is too old to be paired with another gorilla so they opted last month to introduce her to Panda, a Dutch rabbit, instead.

'Right off the bat, they hit it off,' said the zoo's director Cindy Kreider, to the Erie Times-News.
There was one time the zoo's chief executive Scott Mitchell recalled to the paper, however, where all breath was held when Panda hopped over to Samantha's favorite stuffed toy gorilla named Baby.

The park officials knew in advance, no one is to mess with Baby.
With Panda moving toward the toy, to the relief of workers, Samantha instead pushed Baby away, moving the doll so Panda could get by.
Officials at the zoo say Samantha has always had a gentle personality and that if she was much younger, and they were not as familiar with her behavior, there could have possibly been more of a risk.
Instead Samantha was hand-raised and was more comfortable around humans even when Rudy was alive.