What’s In a Name: Kayu Merah and Hadiah

Those were the names picked for the two female Malayan tiger cubs at BREC’s Baton Rouge Zoo, thanks to a public online vote. Kayu Merah means “Red Stick,” and Hadiah means “Gift” in Malay. The votes were taken on BREC’s website over two weeks in early January; the zoo’s Kaki Heiligenthal says about 1,100 votes were cast.

Born in July, they are the first tiger cubs birthed at the zoo in 25 years. Heiligenthal says they will stay on exhibit with their mom, Nazira, until they are 2 years old, at which point they will likely move to another zoo.

“We asked the public to submit name suggestions in November and got back everything from Boudreaux and Thibodeaux to Les and Miles,” Heiligenthal says. For the vote, the zoo’s animal-keeping staff chose their four favorites, reflecting the tigers’ Southeast Asian ancestry. There are only 19 of this species in affiliated zoos worldwide and about 500 left in the wild. brzoo.org