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Births of pandas in captivity hit record number
(Washington Post)
Updated: 2005-11-25 14:57
A survey last year by the State Forestry Administration showed that the
number of giant pandas living in the wild has also risen, to an estimated 1,590,
up from 1,110 in the 1980s. Most roam the isolated hills of China's Sichuan,
Gansu and Shaanxi provinces, eating bamboo and staying as far as they can from
human beings. The population has grown over the last several years, scientists
said, because the government has turned large parts of the panda's habitat into
reserves where logging and farming are forbidden.
This marks a turnaround from the years when China's ever-expanding human
population intruded on the hillsides where giant pandas live and breed, turning
them into an endangered species. The panda, whose markings and chubby contours
seem to invite cuddling, in fact is easily distressed by contact with human
beings, research has shown, and it seems to thrive best when left alone among
the bamboo stands of central China's misty mountains.
Partly for that reason, scientists for years have had trouble getting captive
giant pandas to reproduce. With a limited number of males to choose from in
captivity, picky females often resisted advances, they found, and males in
contact with humans at zoos and research institutes seldom seemed to show much
ardor. Fewer than a third of captive pandas have mated naturally.
As a result, intensive efforts have been under way since the 1960s to breed
pandas by artificial insemination. As techniques and knowledge improve, the
artificial route has begun to show better results, particularly since the turn
of the century.
The Chengdu facility's director, Zhang Zhihe, held out
the promise of repeating and perhaps improving on this year's productive season
in coming years. "Gradually, from year to year, we have begun to know more about
giant pandas, their genetic makeup, their habits, their nutrition and so on," he
said in an interview. "And the more we know about them, the more we can help
them reproduce."
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