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Bear Planet Poll
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What you think when is okay to kill bears?
Total votes: 3996
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Giant Panda
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Probably no animal in history has gone so far toward capturing
the hearts of human beings as the plumpish, clumsy looking creature called the Giant Panda
and many debates took place to know if one were to bring closer the pandas the raccoons or the bears.
The recent genetic analyses show that the giant panda is closer
to the bears whereas the red panda is closer to the raccoons....
Minion of of children, zoo men, wild animal hunters, photographers and toy makers everywhere.
Since its official discovery, more than a century a go,
in the remote, mountainous regions of western China - Giant Panda like not any other animal
quite so intrigued and baffled naturalist.
The giant panda (Ailuropoda melanoleuca), sometimes called the black-and-white cat-foot,
is a kind of mammal from the family of the bears (Ursidae). The Ailuropodinae is the oldest family of the most primitive
lineage of bears and the fossils of the oldest ancestral panda, Ailuropoda lufengensesis, which are found
in souther China, are about 8 million years old. Comparative blood-protein tests
and molecular-genetic investigations of the recent research has also indicated that while the giant panda branched off independently on the evolutinary
tree, it is indeed closer to the bear family than to the raccoon.
Thus the large Panda is to be arranged now clearly in the family of the bears,
as an only well-known living representative of the family Ailuropoda.
Sometimes as symbol of the WWF and also the protection of species
generally he attained world-wide admittingness despite his very much
limited circulation area.
The existence of this puzzling animal was first revealed in 1869 when a French missionary naturalist
Pere Jean Pierre Armand David, astonished fellow scientists by sending back to Paris a description, pelt and
skeleton of new species he namen Ursus melanoleucus or "black white bear". He concluded that they
more closely resembled those of a much smaller animal known to occupy the same territory: the red panda
which looked like a cross between a raccoon and a fox but revealed its primary ancestry in a raccoonlike body
and facial stripes and a long ringed tail.
The stronghold of the giant panda is the formidable fastness of the easter HImalayas near the Chinese-Tibetian border,
a vast wilderness of jagged peaks thrusting 20,000 feet in the air above cavernous valleys and torrential
mountain streams.
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Panda Characteristic
Like bears, giant pandas are basically heavy ponderous land creatures.
The giant panda reaches a length from 120 to 190 centimeter and the weight of adults of animals varies from 75 to 130 kilograms,
though like many bears they can climb trees to escape danger or take a nap and are especially adept at climbing when young.
Although it was long thought that bamboo was the sole item in the diet of the panda, bones found in stomachs of
dead animals idicate that the species is carnivorous, occasionally eating small mammals as well as birds and carrion.
They live alone except when breeding and the female generally produces one offspring in winter, sometimes two.
The panda's odd markings are still something of a mystery. According to one theory, under certain conditions of contrasting light and shadow on
winter snow the black and white markings acs as camouflage, though "bei shung" has few enemies to fear in its mountain retreat.
 Although it was once thought that the giant panda population did not exceed 150 or 200 individuals, more
recent, educated guesses have put the figure at several thousand animals.
What is black and white and black and white and black and white?
Pandas symbolize the diversity and tenacity of life and they does not realize
that are on the brink of extinction. Just as humans are the cause of its decline,
only humans can now prevent it from ceasing to exist altogether.
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Panda Bear Fact
- Name: Panda Bear (Ailuropoda melanoleuca)
- Kingdom: Animalia
- Phylum: Chordata
- Subphylum: Vertebrata
- Class: Mammalia
- Subclass: Theria
- Order: Carnivora
- Family: Ursidae
- Age at Maturity: 5 to 6 years
- Length of life: 30 years in captivity. Unknown in the wild.
- Size: 160 to 190 cm
- Weight: 75 to 130 kg males
- Habitat: Mountain forest
- Diet: Bamboo, wild plants
- Gestation: 4 to 6 months in the wild. Average 5 months.
In the captivity 3 to 5 months.
- Cubs: 1 to 2 cubs, rarely 3
- SubFamily: Ursinae
- Genus: Ailuropoda
- Distribution: China
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The giant pandas remote and nearly inaccessible HImalayan habitat and
the protection provided by the Chinese government safeguard it from hunters guns.
Signicificant studies of pandas in the wild does not exist. Almost all scientific
knowledge of their behavior has of necessity been based on observations of captive animals in zoos.
They weigh only approximately 90 to 130 gram and are covered with pouring rem white skin.
With approximately one month young animals have the typical skin design,
with 40 to 60 days open them the eyes and with five to six months take them
for the first time solid food to itself. With eight to nine months the young animals
are cured finally and leave the mother with approximately 18 months.