Nandi the elephant is very excited to turn 6 months old

Nandi the elephant is six months old.

To celebrate this milestone, keepers at Reid Park Zoo in Tucson, Arizona, gifted the pachyderm with a decorated box packed with hay.

It turns out, the snack was the perfect gift. A series of photos posted to Facebook captured the young one’s excitement.

(It turns out babies of all species are the same: they like playing with boxes.)

Nandi’s certainly not the first to celebrate a zoo birthday.

Just yesterday, the San Diego Zoo Safari Park celebrated the first birthday of its youngest gorilla, Joanna. Joanna had a rocky start — she was delivered via emergency cesarean section — and spent her first 11 days in a veterinary hospital with pneumonia.

Zoo staff gave the gorilla a cardboard dollhouse and a cake made with puréed yams at her birthday party.

[network video]

In 2013, Ernie the North American porcupine got dolled up for his sixth birthday. A photo of him wearing a birthday hat went viral on Reddit.

[porcupine photo]

And who can resist a tiny hedgehog in a party hat?

[hedgehog video]