After a Chinese zoo was forced to deny that one of their sun bears was actually a human in a costume, the same cheeky bear has been seen waving at visitors.
Hangzhou Zoo in Zhejiang, eastern China, had to make a statement this week after its sun bear - called Angela - went viral for her human-like way of standing, and the wrinkly fur on her bottom which made it look like an ill-fitting pair of trousers.
Both of these facts meant many people on social media were convinced Angela wasn't a real sun bear and that what they were seeing was actually a human dressed up as the bear instead.
The sun bear typically lives in the tropical forests of Southeast Asia and is the smallest type of bear at up to 1.3 meters tall, but stocky, and has large paws with strongly curved claws, small rounded ears, and a short snout. They are typically jet black in color (but can also vary from grey to red) and get their name from their characteristic orange or cream-colored patch on their chest.
After Angela went viral, Hangzhou Zoo shared a statement written from her perspective confirming that she is indeed a real bear and not a man in a bear suit.
After footage of Angela standing on her hind legs as she interacted with tourists went viral when it was shared on Douyin, which is the Chinese equivalent to TikTok, the zoo wrote: "Some people think I stand like a human, and it seems that you don’t understand me that much.
"Previously, some tourists thought that I was too tiny to be a bear. I have to emphasize again: I am a Malayan sun bear! Not a black bear! Not a dog! A sun bear!"
While that explanation might have been enough to appease some followers, new footage has since come out showing Angela behaving in a very human-like manner again.
The sweet little four-year-old sun bear was captured waving at tourists that had visited the zoo to see her, standing up on her hind legs as she did so.
Compared to most bears, which can stand at up to 2.8 meters tall on their hind legs, sun bears are much smaller in stature, reaching just 1.3 meters at the most when stood up.
They are classed as vulnerable animals and are on the red list of the International Union for Conservation of Nature, with the population having shrunk by a third in the last 30 years.
And while Angela does, admittedly, look very much like a human pretending to be a bear, according to experts there's no doubt that she is indeed a real sun bear.
Wong Siew Te, a wildlife biologist and the founder of the Bornean Sun Bear Conservation Centre in Malaysia, who has researched sun bears for the past 25 years, told NBC News: "[It is] a sun bear for sure.
"Sun bears could be very human-like. They stand like humans and walk like humans," adding that sun bear mothers can carry their young in their arms while walking on their hind legs, similar to humans.
Wong added: "Sun bears are the least known bears in the world. I believe the incident could call people’s attention on how sun bears may look like humans and hopefully could [let people know] that they are endangered species because of human activities."
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