Wild pandas threatened by bamboo shortage

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Source: CCTV.com | 11-26-2007 10:21

Giant pandas in the wild are facing possible food shortages as the bamboo they eat is flowering and dying without being replenished. Sichuan province-- which is China's main panda habitat-- has beefed up efforts to monitor the situation and respond to the shortage.

Piankou nature Reserve is located in Beichuan county, north of Sichuan province. This area is seriously threatened by the bamboo blossoming. More than 20 giant pandas live here, amongst three types of bamboo.

Giant pandas's usually live 2.7 to 3.2 kilometers above sea level. But bamboo growing at 2.7 kilometers or more above sea level is blossoming and turning black. Pandas can not eat this kind of bamboo. The life span of bamboo is sixty years. And in this reserve, 40 percent of all bamboo has died from flowering since 2004.

Ren Jihong, deputy chief of Beichuan Forestry Bureau, said, "This kind of large-scale bamboo death never happened before. Usually, the older bamboo dies, with new ones growing. Therefore, after six to seven years, giant pandas can eat it. "

New statistics from the Sichuan Bureau of Forestry show bamboo blossoms have been spotted in half of the panda reserves in the province. The reserves cover more than 60 thousand hectares and Pandas eat 3.5 percent of their bamboo here.

In response, the reserve has prepared vehicles and medicine. Once the sick and hungry giant pandas are found, the rescue workers send the ill pandas to a center in Wolong.

Xiong Beirong, director of Sichuan Department of Forestry, said, "We have forty Giant panda reserves in Sichuan Province. We have issued warnings to all of them, asking them keep a very close watch on the bamboo blossoming and to keep the government informed."

Experts say bamboo flowering is a natural phenomenon out of the hands of human control. Supervision and rescue is useful, but helping pandas freely find new food sources will also be important.

In 1984 and 1987, mountainous regions witnessed extensive blossoming of the arrow bamboo - the pandas' favorite variety - where the plants flowered, seeded and died.

Editor:Zhang Ning