The Panda Bear

Panda bears are my favorite animals. I've always found them so cute and interesting. I wanted to look up more information about them and learn things that I'd never known about pandas. Here is the information I was able to find.

Panda bears are the same size as a Black bear. Adult Pandas can grow to be five to six feet high and can weigh up to two-hundred seventy six pounds. Although females and males can both weigh about the same, males typically weigh ten to twenty percent more than the female Pandas do.

One of the biggest enemy to the Panda is actually humans. They don't really have any predators out there that try to hunt them for food. It's mostly just humans trying to hunt them for there fur. Their fur can be sold for 100,000 dollars. That's why selfish humans are their biggest enemy. The average Panda living out in the wild will live up to twenty five years or more if left alone in it's natural habitat.

Although Panda's feet look very different from humans, they walk in the same manner. Both heel and toe make contact with the ground. Panda bears don't go by that name everywhere. In China, they call the Panda "Xiongmao" which means Giant Cat Bear. The Panda was believed to have magical powers that could ward off natural disasters and evil spirits. Writings about the Pandas can be traced back 3,000 years. They were even kept as pets by Chinese Emperors.

The giant panda bear only exists today in six small areas located in inland China. The habitat, suitable for the bamboo on which it survives, is a cold, damp coniferous forest. The elevation ranges from 4,000 to 11,000 feet high. In most of the areas in which they still roam wild, they must compete with farmers who farm the river valleys and the lower slopes of the mountains.

Panda bears eat over fifteen different types of Bamboo. Because of its inefficient intestinal system, the Panda has to eat for twelve to sixteen hours a day to survive. And they can eat anywhere from twenty two to forty pounds of Bamboo just in a single day. However, if the shoots of Bamboo the Panda is eating is fresh, it can consume up to eighty four pounds a day. That's a lot more than I thought they could eat in a day.

The Panda is such a majestic creature. It is sad to think that there may not be Pandas around too much longer if people keep trying to hunt them for their fur. Until people realize that Pandas are such great creatures and that they deserve home as every other living animal does, the Pandas will always be in danger of extinction.