Pandering to Pandas
OR LONG IT’S BEEN ACCEPTED as fact that the mass flowering of arrow bamboo every so often, accompanied by the plant's death, has resulted in pandas dying of starvation. The usual response has been to "rescue" pandas to stock the world’s zoos. However, recent research in China's
Wolong Reserve has shown that pandas adapt to the loss of 80 percent of their food supply. After the bamboo flowers, the pandas are forced to spend more time foraging. They became less choosy about their food, eating shoots that would have been previously discarded. As the pandas eat their way through the remaining patches of arrow bamboo, some eventually make their way down hillsides to eat umbrella bamboo, previously not a favoured part of their diet. The lesson, according to scientists, is that panda reserves must be made much larger to provide sufficient food for the pandas in times of critical need. In some cases where there is only one bamboo source, the pandas should be rescued.
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https://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/periodicals/FORBI19891101.2.11.4
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Forest and Bird, Volume 20, Issue 4, 1 November 1989, Page 6
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168Pandering to Pandas Forest and Bird, Volume 20, Issue 4, 1 November 1989, Page 6
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