Goodbye Huggies!

3.6.2026 – Source: Ouwehands Dierenpark Rhenen, Photos by Rebecca Roth

We said goodbye to a special polar bear. The 32-year-old Huggies was the oldest polar bear in the Netherlands and arrived in Ouwehands Animal Park as a youngster in 1994, after being found in the wild without a mother. During the first period, the young Huggies lived with peer brown bear Björna, who still lives in The Bear Forest.

Being Huggies from the wild, her genes are invaluable to the management program. Those ‘wild’ genes cause extra genetic diversity. So she has played an important role in the maintenance of the reserve population of polar bears in zoos. She has had eleven offspring including a triplet. These offspring have had a boy themselves and meanwhile they also have a boy again. So Huggies is actually a great-grandma!

Unfortunately, her old age also brought complaints of old age. So she had considerable wear and tear on her teeth and advanced osteoarthritis. The painkillers she got for her osteoarthritis didn’t seem to help anymore. In addition, she continued to lose weight, despite being fed separately from other polar bears. That’s why it was decided to euthanize Huggies.

Some facts of Huggies’ life

Geboren: vermutlich 1993 auf der Wrangelinsel (Wildnis)
Gestorben: 00. Juni 2026 in Rhenen

Wildfang

1993 – 02.06.1994 Wrangelinsel (Wildnis)
03.06.1994 – 17.12.1998 Rhenen (Niederlande)
17.12.1998 – 13.03.2002 Kolmarden (Schweden)
13.03.2002 – 00.06.2026 Rhenen

Nachkommen:
2001: Freedom ♀
2005: Ewa ♀
2005: Jelle ♂
2005: Henk ♂
2008: Walker ♂
2008: Swimmer ♂ (gestorben 2009)
2011: Luka ♂
2011:Lynn ♀

Goodbye, beautiful Huggies! You are now wandering on the eternal ice but we are mourning.