Next weekend, the San Francisco Zoo will introduce the world to its new 10-month-old male red panda, but we got our hands on some early behind-the-scenes photos of the tiny panda.


Yeah, we said panda, because the red panda was formally named and described in the scientific literature before the unrelated giant panda.


Did you know that red pandas are the only non-primate species known to be able to taste the sugar substitute aspartame? To learn more about red pandas, check out this post from earlier this year at Scientific American: 7 Things You Didn't Know About Red Pandas.