Posted on 03/27/2005 4:44:44 PM PST by nickcarraway
Nature preserve workers in northwest China's Gansu Province have formulated a rescue plan to save giant pandas from food shortage caused by arrow bamboo flowering.
Zhang Kerong, director of the Baishuijiang State Nature Preserve, said that the preserve will intervene and help giant pandas find new food source.
Zhang said that at the end of a life of arrow bamboo, a favorite of giant pandas, the plant will flower, seed and die. The giant pandas will not eat the bamboo after it blooms and it takes 10 years for a new supply to grow. The bamboo blooming in the early 1980s caused the deaths of about 250 giant pandas.
Zhang said that 22 giant pandas living in the Bikou and Rangshuihe areas, where much of the bamboo is blooming, are currently under the threat of starvation.
Workers in the preserve will move old and weak giant pandas and lure fit pandas to a new habitats, Zhang said.
As of late last year, the flowering bamboo covered more than 7, 000 hectares of the nature preserve. And the blooming area has continued to expand.
The nature preserve, occupying about 220,000 hectares, has 102 giant pandas living wild.
Currently, more than 1,500 giant pandas live in the wild in the country, according to a survey by the State Forestry Administration.
In Sichuan and Shaanxi provinces, two other habitats of giant pandas, arrow bamboo was also found blooming.
The Baishuijiang preserve and local governments have enhanced education about giant panda protection and asked locals not to harm the animals if hungry giant pandas enter villages to look for food.
Zhang said that the preserve will dispatch frequent patrols and rescue giant pandas in danger of starvation.
In China, the pandas are treated a little better than the people.
Gordon Gekko in Wall Street. Stone get's it right for once.
I say if panda's can't feed themselves, and are too stupid to navigate their way to a food source, then they should go the way all dumb creatures go by natures design.
Meanwhile, totalitarian regimes are slaughtering all who don't bow to Allah, and his pedophile prophet, but that's ok.
To be fair, the totalitariam regime in China does slaughter people who bow to Allah, too.
This is true.
I can't include all the worlds woes in my mini rants, otherwize they wouldn't be mini rants, would they... :o)
Eats, shoots and leaves.
Does anyone know what panda tastes like? In conservation circles, if an animal over grazes it's enviroment, you cull.
Expensive game liciences for those willing to hunt would both A) provide money for game management
b) ensure sustainable enviroment for a health herd
See what happens when you become an overly strict vegetarian?
we wouldn't want the poor panda to starve......that would be inhumane.
(I'm sure that I don't have to tell you that I am being sarcastic)
This also bothers me. obviously they eat other things besides bambo. It isn't likely that bambo grows in the villages. A panda is really just a bear and shares many of the same habits. perhaps it's because these "cute things" have been tamed by not so smart enviro wienies; that they have become tamed wander into toen looking for a handout.
Those who abuse and hate animals typically hate people as well.
Now, now! We can't have mass starvation of DUmocrats; the press would be merciless. Besides, who would we laugh & point at then?
Now, in the case of Giant Pandas, I say that any wild animal that is too lazy and uninterested to breed naturally, should regretfully be let go extinct in the wild.
Commercial turkeys and zoo animals are another story.
Even a stopped clock is right twice a day.
No wait, if the pandas can't feed themselves they ought to be STARVED TO DEATH. It is illegal to feed them. Isn't it?? But anyway it's painless if they starve, so what's the big deal? / sarcasm
Typical one-night stand.
What else do pandas eat besides arrow bamboo? Maybe they could organize feeders till new bamboo grows up.
I think you have to give them the benefit of the doubt, because they live under a communist regime, and communists are known for allocating food in such a way that starvations. By my count at least 60 million humans starved to death under communist governments. maybe these are kulak pandas.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.