By Joe Holley
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, August 9, 2007; 3:24 PM

So what do you call a newborn with a Cyrano snout, a two-foot-long tongue (eventually) and a voracious appetite for creepy-crawly creatures?

For the moment, officials at the National Zoo have dubbed their two-week-old giant anteater, "Little Schnozzy," but they're asking the public's help to come up with a permanent name.

Starting today, visitors to the zoo's Web site, www.fonz.org/anteatername.htm, can vote for their favorite name from a list of six possibilities, three for a boy and three for a girl.

Zoo staff won't know for a few more weeks whether the new arrival, the first giant anteater born at the zoo in its 118-year history, is a male or female. The name choices for a female are Aurora, Pilar and Isabel; for a male, Cyrano, Francisco and Ferdinand. The tiny creature's 4-year-old mother is called Maripi; its 5-year-old father, Dante.

Cute and helpless at the moment, the little creature could grow up to weigh as much as 90 pounds and stretch as much as seven feet from snout to tail. In the wilds of Central and South America, a giant anteater spends its days probing the air with its long, thin nose in search of rotten logs to claw open and juicy termites to vacuum up, occasionally sticking out the tip of its two-foot-long tongue to locate the 30,000 or so insects consumed daily.

As a zoo creature, Little Schnozzy will gets its share of insects and, if he/she takes after its father, a daily dollop of yogurt.

The exhibit at the National Zoo is next to Lemur Island. The zoo says the mother and baby are most likely to be seen between 8 and 11 a.m.

Voting on the name ends Aug. 26.