That he did not want, that he did not want...

2002/12/23 Galarraga Aiestaran, Ana - Elhuyar Zientzia

• Zoologia
• Ekologia

The panda feeds exclusively on bamboo and spends 14 hours a day filling the stomach.

Who does not know Panda? And it has a warm and affectionate appearance, it seems almost a stuffed animal, and surely that is why it concentrates the attention of the people. That is why and because he is in a very serious situation: he is known to be in danger of extinction.

Until 1869 he was practically unknown. That same year, on his way to Tibet, Ezpelese naturalist Armand David stayed in the Principality of Moupin investigating animals and plants. And then they spoke to him for the first time about the polar bear.

At first he thought it would be an albino variety of the Himalayan black bear. But he soon had the opportunity to analyze the pandas and found that they were really black and white: they had a white body, but they had black arms, neck, legs, ears and "glasses."

In addition, he realized that it was a species not described until then, so, aware of the importance of the discovery, he gave his scientific name and sent to Paris a provisional description for publication as soon as possible. Therefore, one boxer was the one who presented the great panda in the West. However, its name ( Ursus melanoleucus) was not correct, because it does not take the same gender, and today scientists call it Ailuropoda melanoleuca. Kepa Altogana has written about all this in the book "Armand David, the father of Panda".

Giant Shampoo

From the remains sent by Armand David, those responsible for the Museum of Natural History of Paris elaborated this image.

Since those times, pandas have become famous and no longer have secrets for naturalists. Giant Panda adults weigh between 85 and 125 kg and have a length of 120 to 190 cm. They eat almost bamboo, try meat from time to time and as bamboo is scarce in food, it is not surprising that they spend 14 hours a day. How to satisfy such a big animal!

They are little breeding animals: every 2-3 years the female has only one breeding and rarely twins are born. The young are born blind and hairless and weigh only 80-120 g. But they grow fast and weigh 20 times more in 8 weeks. When they are about a year old they start eating bamboo and continue with their mothers until the birth of the next baby, which is about 18 months old. At 4.5-7.5 years reach maturity.

The Panda inhabit bamboo forests at 1,200-3,400 m altitude. Formerly they also lived in lower valleys and mountains, but now the lands have been occupied by man and the pandas have been marginalized. In addition, for years they have ceded in excess, so the population has decreased considerably and the Chinese government has had to take measures to protect the giant panda: it has declared natural spaces, banned hunting and has launched breeding programs in zoos and natural spaces.

In fact they are not very breeding animals: every two or three years they have only one breeding.

Panda's situation is really serious. In the last two decades, the population has fallen by half and only a thousand wild pandas remain. They are very dispersed and do not have the possibility to move from one protected forest to another, so they present great meeting barriers. In the zoos there is a hundred panda.

There is no way to light the males

In fact, the intention of those responsible for zoos is to proliferate and release pandas, thus guaranteeing their survival. But they cannot fulfill their plans. It seems that zoos reproduce less than in nature. Most born panda children have been created by artificial insemination and have not yet managed to release any zoo born panda.

According to the researchers, males have no sexual intention, and that is the main reason for the failure of the reproductive program. Researchers have tried everything to revitalize males: they have given them medicinal plants, they have tried with Viagra... In vain!

Thinking that the problem was more a lack of education than physics, it was thought to give sex education classes to other researchers. To do this, they prepared some videos explaining how the male covered the female and put them on the tambourines. It seems that some of the panda were eager to learn and have been more passionate than before.

However, the results are still not as satisfactory as expected and continue with attempts to increase pandas craving. They have recently asked for help with computer science and have developed a special program that analyzes the health status of pandas and their degree of kinship. This lets you know when the time is right to cover yourself and whether the couple is right. See if they are more successful!

For its part, the organization WWF, dedicated to protecting Panda, has denounced that the zoos program is incorrect. In fact, the panda that is taken from nature and collected in the zoos dies there without leaving offspring. According to WWF, captive males are often not hungry for sex because their partner is not adequate.

However, the worst thing about being in zoos is that they cannot act as when they are in nature. In fact, in nature the pandas are solitary, each occupies a certain area and only join in a time of zeal. Then the males fight each other and the winner covers the female. A male also covers more than one female. Therefore, to prevent the population of the pandas from decreasing, from WWF it is proposed to facilitate the displacement of the pandas from one natural space to another. Leave the pandas in peace and free, and once assembled, they will know what to do!

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