The Giant Panda - A National Icon of China

1. The giant panda bear is native to the mountainous regions of central and southern China. The giant panda would have once inhabited more lowland regions like jungles and grassy plains although the giant panda is now restricted to the higher mountain areas due to increased farming and habitat destruction in the lowlands. In recent years that giant panda has become an extremely important icon for China, a country who generally regard the dragon as being its main national emblem. The Chinese people have begun to use the giant panda more and more on flags and emblems and are keen to help to promote the conservation of the giant panda. The giant panda bear is an omnivore eating a range of things from honey, to fish and small mammals. The giant panda bear’s diet consists of roughly 95% bamboo, which the panda needs to eat as the bamboo plays a crucial part in the giant panda’s digestion and water intake. Today the giant panda is considered to be an endangered species with only 1,500 giant pandas thought to be left in the wild. Giant pandas are fairly docile bears as the giant panda rarely comes into contact with people in the wild. However, the giant pandas have been known to attack humans when confronted particularly when the giant panda is kept in captivity.

2. Information • The giant panda has an insatiable appetite for bamboo. A typical animal eats half the day — a full 12 out of every 24 hours — and relieves itself dozens of times a day. It takes 12.5 kilograms of bamboo to satisfy a giant panda's daily dietary needs, and it hungrily plucks the stalks with elongated wrist bones that function rather like thumbs. Pandas will sometimes eat birds or rodents as well.

3. The cuddly looking giant panda is the rarest and most endangered species of the bear family. Its distinctive black and white markings, fluffy coat and ponderous, waddling walk endear the giant panda to people all around the world. These awesome animals are among the world's most threatened species with only about 1,600 left in the wild. Giant pandas can't continue to survive in the wild without human protection.

4. Where Giant Pandas Live Giant pandas are solitary. They have a highly developed sense of smell that males use to avoid each other and to find females for mating in the spring. After a five-month pregnancy, females give birth to a cub or two, though they cannot care for both twins. The blind infants weigh only 142 grams at birth and cannot crawl until they reach three months of age. They are born white, and develop their much loved colouring later. There are only about 1,500 giant pandas left in the wild. Perhaps 200 pandas live in zoos, where they are always among the most popular attractions. Much of what we know about pandas comes from study of these zoo animals, because their wild cousins are so rare and elusive. Wild giant pandas inhabit a mountainous area in southwest China including Gansu, Shaanxi, and Sichuan provinces. In the past they roamed a much larger area that included the lowlands, but human development drove them into the mountains and continues to threaten the wild population on unprotected lands. Wild giant pandas currently live only in the dense bamboo underbrush of the mountain forests. Wild pandas live only in remote, mountainous regions in central China. These high bamboo forests are cool and wet—just as pandas like it. They may climb as high as 3,962 metres to feed on higher slopes in the summer season.

5. By Joseph! My photos were taken at the Adelaide Zoo, South Australia – with permission