Latest Giant Pandas Stories

Officials in China have sent emergency rations of bamboo-shoots to a reserve housing pandas in the earthquake zone in Sichuan province, China's state media reported Thursday. The move was made because no one was collecting food for the bears in the aftermath of China's most devastating earthquake in decades.According to a government Web site, 47 people were killed near the Wolong Conservation and Research Centre for the Giant Panda, the nation's largest panda breeding center. Thirty-five...

Researchers in the Cardiff School of Biosciences will work with international colleagues on the "˜Giant Panda Genome Project'. The panda is often referred to as a "˜living fossil', given evidence that its ancestors existed in China more than 8 million years ago. Research by Professor Mike Bruford, Cardiff School of Biosciences, previously found that the decline of the species can be linked directly to human activities rather than a genetic inability to adapt and evolve. However, little...

BGI-Shenzhen is pleased to announce the launch of the International Giant Panda Genome Project. This announcement follows on the heels of the Panda Genome workshop held on January 21"“22, 2008, in Shenzhen, China. Dr. Hongmei Zhu, a scientist from BGI-Shenzhen, stated that, "The goal of this project is to finish the sequencing and assembling of the draft sequence within six months." The giant panda is a much loved animal all over the world and is considered a symbol of China, as...

BEIJING (AP) - A 16-month-old giant panda born at half the weight of most newborn pandas is growing into a normal, healthy animal in southwest China, state media reported Thursday.Wushiyike, who weighed in at 1.8 ounces when he was born at the Chengdu Giant Panda Reproduction and Research Center now weighs 80 pounds, Xinhua News Agency cited the center's director Zhang Zhihe as saying."Wushiyike" means 1.8 ounces in Mandarin, the national language.Giant pandas usually weigh more...

SAN DIEGO (AP) - A male panda born four years ago at the San Diego Zoo left for China on Monday to join that country's breeding program.Mei Sheng, which translates as "Born in the USA," was sent to the Wolong Nature Reserve for Giant Pandas as part of a loan agreement requiring all pandas born outside China to be returned there after the animals mature, zoo officials said."Mei Sheng will be missed ... but his role in the conservation of his species involves a move to...

BEIJING (AP) - China will fly a pair of giant pandas to Spain next month, state media reported Saturday, following through on a goodwill gesture promised during a visit by Spanish King Juan Carlos to Beijing earlier this year.The pair, seven-year old "Bing Xing" and four-year old "Hua Zui Ba" will be flown from their home in the southwestern city of Chengdu to Madrid on Sept. 8 by chartered plane for a ten-year stay, the Xinhua News Agency said.The pair are due to go on...

BANGKOK, Thailand - After panda porn failed to spark amour, Thai zoo authorities turned Monday to artificial insemination in the hope of impregnating their lone female giant panda.Authorities at the Chiang Mai Zoo in northern Thailand inseminated Lin Hui with semen from her cage-mate, Chuang Chuang, on Monday morning and will repeat the procedure on Tuesday. The artificial insemination is a last ditch effort to get Lin Hui pregnant, after videos of pandas having sex failed to entice Chuang...

ATLANTA -- The giant panda cub Mei Lan made her media debut Friday, romping about a Zoo Atlanta exhibit area for a crowd of reporters and cameras while her mother chomped bamboo. The 16-pound cub and her mother, Lun Lun, have been in seclusion since the cub's birth on Sept. 6. Panda fans have been keeping up with the duo on the zoo Web site's panda cam and live video feeds at the exhibit.Friday marked the beginning of limited public viewing of the pair, which the zoo expects will bring a...

MEMPHIS, Tenn. (AP) - The Memphis Zoo is hoping a few days of privacy will include a magic moment between its giant pandas.The panda exhibit was closed for 72 hours beginning Thursday to give Ya Ya and Le Le some time to mate.A female panda has only three days a year to conceive, according to Matt Thompson, the curator of the zoo's mammal wing and overseer of the panda exhibit.The two have been placed together during previous mating periods although officials didn't hope for much because the...

BEIJING (AP) - A mini-baby boom last year has pushed up the number of pandas bred in captivity in China to 217, state media said Wednesday.Some 34 pandas were born by artificial insemination in 2006 and 30 survived - both record numbers for the endangered species, Cao Qingyao, a spokesman for the State Forestry Administration, was quoted as saying by the Xinhua News Agency.The previous record was the 21 baby pandas born in China's zoos and breeding centers in 2005.China has been raising...