Knut
Knut was born at the Berlin Zoological Garden on December 5, 2006. His mother Tosca rejected him for unknown reasons, abandoning him and his twin brother (who later died) on a rock in the polar bear compound. Being the size of a guinea pig, Knut spent the first 44 days of his life in an incubator before zoo keeper Thomas Dörflein began hand raising the cub. Knut's need for around-the-clock care required that Dörflein sleep on a mattress next to Knut's night enclosure as well as play with, bathe, and feed him, beginning with a bottle of milk every two hours before graduating at the age of four months to a milk porridge mixed with cat food, vitamins and cod liver. Dörflein also accompanied Knut on his twice daily shows for the public and has appeared in many videos and photographs alongside the cub.
On 23 March 2007, Knut was presented to the public for the first time. Around 400 journalists visited Berlin Zoo on what was dubbed "Knut Day" to report on the cub's first public appearance to a worldwide audience. Despite Der Spiegel reporting on April 30, 2007 that Knut was "steadily getting less cute" as he increased in age, Knut continued to bring in record crowds to the zoo. There were 400,000 guests recorded in August 2007, which was an all time high.
Knut first gained worldwide attention in part due to videos on Youtube that showed his life as a small cub. Since then, Knut has been the subject of several songs, the most successful of which were the singles "Knut is Cute" and "Knut, der kleine Eisbär" (English: "Knut, the little polar bear") by nine-year-old Kitty from Köpenick. A blog with updates about the polar bear is also maintained by a journalist at the regional public broadcaster Rundfunk Berlin-Brandenburg; it is available in German, English and Spanish. Knut has also been the subject of several DVDs, including one entitled "Knut – Stories from a Polar Bear's Nursery". He also appeared on the March 29, 2007 cover of the German Vanity Fair magazine.
A year later, two additional polar bear cubs born in German zoos attracted worldwide attention, drawing direct comparisons to Knut. Flocke from the Nuremberg Zoo and Wilbaer from Wilhelma were both born in early December 2007. In contrast to Knut and Flocke, however, Wilbaer has stayed under the care of his mother and has therefore not garnered as much attention.
Knut died on March 19, 2011.
Read more about this topic: List Of Non-fictional Bears