By now, the San Diego Zoo had seen so much reproductive success in its history that having a species born for the first time had become an uncommon event—but there were two exciting firsts in mid 1999.

In May and June, the two female Chacoan peccaries that had come to the Zoo as a part of Proyecto Tagua, the conservation program for this species, gave birth to the Zoo’s first-ever peccary piglets. The three bristly babies were perfect miniatures of their parents, complete with tough, mobile snouts that they began using almost immediately to root, snort, and snuffle their way around their Zoo habitat. Their births were cause for celebration in the ongoing conservation effort to save this species, which at one time scientists had thought was extinct.

It was a great day for cat lovers everywhere when three Malayan tiger cubs were born at the Zoo’s Tiger River on June 10, 1999. The Zoo had decided to focus on a breeding program for this critically endangered tiger subspecies in 1994, and had welcomed two young male tigers to join female Danai. A video camera installed in the off-exhibit den allowed keepers to watch Danai give birth to her three cubs, a female and two males. The keepers continued to monitor and record Danai’s excellent maternal care as the trio grew, providing useful behavior observations and cub development data for future tiger breeding efforts.