The giant panda has an appetite for bamboo. A typical animal

SATIATE

eats half the day and relieves itself dozens of times a day. It takes 12

kilograms of bamboo to satisfy a giant panda's daily needs,

DIET

and it plucks the stalks with elongated wrist bones that

HUNGER

function like thumbs. Pandas will sometimes eat birds or rodents as well.

Wild pandas live only in remote, regions in central China. These

MOUNTAIN

high bamboo forests are cool and wet — just as pandas like it. They may

climb as high as 4,000 meters to feed on higher slopes in the summer.

Pandas are often seen eating in a relaxed sitting , with their hind

POSITION

legs stretched out before them. They may appear sedentary, but they are

skilled tree-climbers and swimmers.

EFFECT

Giant pandas are solitary and have a developed sense of smell that males

use to avoid each other and to find females for mating in the spring.

After a five-month , females give birth to a cub or two, though

PREGNANT

they cannot care for both twins. The blind infants weigh only 140 grams at

birth and cannot crawl until they reach three months of age. They are born

white, and develop their much loved later.

COLOUR

There are only about 1,000 giant pandas left in the wild. Perhaps 100 pandas

live in zoos, where they are always among the most popular attraction.