What are the characteristics of giant pandas?

The giant panda is a mammal of the family Pandas of the carnivorous order, with black and white body, round cheeks, big black circles, chubby body and iconic eight-character walking way. it is the flagship species of biodiversity conservation in the world. there are less than 1600 giant pandas in the world, belonging to China's first-class protected animals. Let's take a look at the characteristics of giant pandas.

Morphological characteristics

The giant panda is as fat as a bear, plump and rich, with a short round head and tail, with a head length of 1200mm to 1800mm and a tail length of 100mm. The weight is 80,120kg, and the maximum weight is 180kg. The panda is slightly heavier, and the average male is slightly larger than the female. The hair color of the head and body is black and white, but black is not pure black, white is not pure white, but black is brown in black and yellow in white. The individual in Qinling area is large, the body hair is rough, and the abdominal hair is slightly brown. Minshan (especially Pingwu in Qingchuan) has smaller individuals, finer body hair and less brown abdominal hair, but the individuals in Liangshan are not too small.

Food habit

Giant pandas are omnivorous animals, but giant pandas initially eat meat, but also have the potential of carnivores, but rarely eat animals or animal carcasses, this is not because it does not like to eat meat, but the lack of opportunities. Because in the distribution area of giant pandas, there are few large carnivores, and there are not many carcasses left for him to eat. If you often catch small animals such as mice, the nutrition you get is often not enough to compensate for the energy consumed. As a result, giant pandas can only eat a little meat occasionally, and most of the time they rely on bamboo step by step to maintain their life, and become animals that follow the rules and live according to bamboo all their lives.

Character and characteristics

Giant pandas are usually very docile in temperament. When they meet people for the first time, they often cover their forepalms, or keep their heads down and do not show their true face. They seldom take the initiative to attack other animals or people. When they encounter each other accidentally in the wild, they always use the way of avoidance. But as soon as she becomes a mother, her baby is sacrosanct, and even a caring visit will make the mother angry, open her teeth and claws, and move her hands and feet. Sometimes they also like to make some embellishments and other adaptive activities. You can straighten your body like a cat, with the front stretched out and the back half lifted to allow the body to stretch flexibly, or after waking up, the forelegs stretch out and yawn. If you get wet or wade across the river, you can shake off the water like a dog.

Behavior characteristics

Giant pandas spend half of their time eating every day, and most of the rest is spent in sleep. In the wild, giant pandas sleep for 2 to 4 hours in the middle of every two meals. Lying flat, lying on their side, lying prone, stretching or curling up are their favorite ways of sleeping. In the zoo, keepers feed them regularly twice a day, so giant pandas spend the rest of their time resting. Giant pandas look cute even when they sleep. They are very flexible and can put their bulky bodies in a variety of postures. Their favorite posture is to hold their legs on a tree and cover their eyes with their hands.

Breeding characteristics

The newborn of the giant panda is quite immature at birth, weighing only 0.1% of its mother's body weight. The newborn cub is very light, with an average birth weight of about 145g, about 1/1000 of the adult giant panda's weight, the lightest is 51g, and the heaviest is 225g. Taking care of a child is a daunting task for a female giant panda, which usually takes 18 months, sometimes as long as two years, until her next child is born. In the wild, if twins are born, giant panda mothers usually ignore or reject the weaker one, which ensures the survival of at least one. In the case of captivity, artificial breeding will be carried out and the cub exchange technique will be adopted to make all the giant panda cubs survive as far as possible.