Top 31 Fun Facts About Pandas

Damp and dewy thickly populated forests are the best-residing place for this scarce mammal.

According to the National Geographic, the immense girth of giant pandas owes to their size weighing about 136 kg with 5-6 feet in height.

The following fact about pandas is that there has been a significant drop of species of Panda all over the earth, which pushed this bamboo bear a near extinction status (currently Vulnerable as per IUCN classification), with just 1600 pandas in the world alive to date.

A minority of giant pandas are held in reserves in safari parks of the Western Domain.

It is estimated that an average panda eats for about half a time during 24 hours in a day (almost 16 hours). The chubby pandas are usually found eating most of the time.

Since pandas keep bamboo as their primary source of nutrition, which lacks the high-calorie content? So, they eat a lot to nourish their huge body.

Another interesting fact about Panda is that in the Olympics of 2022, Panda was one of the animals represented and designated as mascots of the Olympics among four other animals, namely Fish, Fuwa, Tibetian Antelope, and Sand Martin.

The matter of putting pandas under appropriate classification has been quite disagreeable among biologists. Though relatively similar to bears, they have been classified as raccoons also.

However, they were finalized to be grouped along with bears specifically closely related to bears of the South American region.

Big bamboo eaters need a big bamboo digesting stomach to grasp hard bamboo. The stomach of pandas can correctly digest the tough bamboo wood possessing more muscles than a normal animal stomach.

The inner surface of the stomach has the superficial protection of a mucus layer to prevent the stomach lining from rupturing by the sharp bamboo fragments.

The song “I’m so lonely I have nobody” is the best fit for pandas. Panda likes to live alone.

According to National Geographic, the presence of another panda is strongly disliked in the territory by the owner panda.

However, it would end up in a hitting dispute if the two encounters a close encounter.

Pandas like to mark their land of ownership by accentuating the limits through a sticky, waxy secretion. The secretion acts as a marker for territory identification, even recognized by other pandas.

Pandas use this secretion for the identification of gender and the purpose of recognizing the social status of other giant pandas.

Pandas have an enhanced ability to grasp the food with their paws due to enlarged wrist bones that act as an extra thumb for handling the bamboos.

This extra bone of their wrist is termed pseudo-bone as not an original thumb but an extension of the wrist of front paws.

Being carnivores, pandas can exhibit extreme bite power more than any other carnivore. This extreme bite force in pandas owes to the presence of strong muscles meant for chewing hard bamboo layers.

Panda has an opposing thumb like Gorillas which helps them to grip bamboo stalks efficiently.

Though carnivorous, pandas primarily like to feed on bamboo sprouts and leaves. Since bamboo does not run away like most carnivores’ foods, it suits the lazy, sluggish nature of pandas.

The other panda diet consists of eating other small animals, fish, and other vegetation but eating bamboo always remains the all-time favorite.

Naturally, female pandas ovulate just once a year and give birth to two panda cubs after an incubation period of almost five months.

In the uninhabited environment, only the stronger baby pandas survive. However, in relief centers of Panda rehabilitation, the survival chances for both the cubs are increased.

Though being considered extinct, pandas bear a fantastic reproductive potential. Their presence on the earth could evidence it for more than 20 million years.

Now confined to just certain parts of Central China, they were earlier supposed to be present across the Chinese territory.

The carnivorous pandas bear wide and horizontal molar teeth. This makes them able to chop down the shoots and wood of the bamboo tree.

In a total of possessing 42 teeth that arrive in two sets in their lifespan (similar to humans), giant pandas can easily peel off the bamboo in less than a minute!

Pandas have a massive crush on bamboos. It could starve out in the absence of bamboo trees.

The life cycle of bamboo is quite long, extending over almost 120 years.

This makes it difficult for pandas to survive without bamboo.

Apart from bamboos, pandas also have a strong fondness for living in close vicinity of water. Pandas are remarkable swimmers and live delightfully in the presence of water.

That is the reason they are found in dense, bamboo forests of Chinese wild making it an ideal habitat for their survival.

Pandas are introvert buddies! They prefer to avoid mingling up quickly and require time to come at ease.

This makes them shy and resilient animals usually confided from other species and humans.

Pandas are very good at climbing heights. With an ability to climb heights of about 12000-13000 feet, giant pandas love to make their homes on slopes of mountains for feeding purposes during the summer seasons.

Under confinement, female pandas give birth to more panda cubs as compared to when living in the wild environment.

Panda mothers give birth to twins at an increased rate under stay in rehabilitation centers.

Panda is believed to be fond of licking metals like iron and copper.

Under captivity, any food given to them in utensils of metals like iron or copper, they seem to relish it by cleaning it up with the help of their tongue.

Since pandas are big eaters, it is expected that they would produce a lot of waste material. About 10- 30 kg of waste is produced by an average panda in a single day.

Scientists have been using the smell of waste to track down pandas in the wild areas.

Pandas feed on sharp bamboo parts. Naturally, pandas have a distinctive covering over their throat to protect against sharp edges and splinters of bamboo trees.

Pandas possess alternative colored skin with superficial fur black and white. The white fur blends in snowy habitats, and black fur creates a masking impact in forests and heat-retaining capability during the winter.

This adaptation is very similar to how tigers camouflage with their stripes.

Pandas are believed to rely more the memory regarding the judgment of location somewhat depending on visual memory.

Pandas do not have a strong vision, and their memory is primarily based upon relying on spatial memory ( i.e., judgment by the ability to remember the location)

About 100 pandas are believed to be living in different zoos of the world today. Pandas may cost up to millions of dollars to be retained in zoos which are 2-5 times more expensive than keeping elephants in zoos.

Giant pandas are found in only scare numbers in zoos of the US having retaining fees of almost million dollars per annum.

Being regarded as a national treasure in China, regulations are firmly followed in case of any killing and slaying of panda species.

About 20 years ago, the penalty for killing pandas was a death sentence. However, the punishment has been reduced to imprisonment of 20 years.

According to biological classification, there are 3 types of pandas namely the red Panda (Ailurus fulgens), the black and white giant Panda, and the smaller brown and fawn sub-species the Qinling Panda (Ailuropoda melanoleuca qinlingensis).

Some argue that the red Panda is loosely related to raccoons.

Pandas are similar to bears and human beings when it comes to the walking style.

The soles of their feet touch the ground wholly in contrast to other animals like horses, dogs, and cats, usually walking on the tips of their feet. They are termed as plantigrade mammals.

Pandas do not hibernate unlike the most other types of bears in the bear family. Before the winter months start, pandas typically migrate from their mountain caves to places where warmer temperatures prevail.

That is where they would find pounds of bamboo to munch all winter long!

In 1961, the British natural history expert and World Wildlife Fund (WWF) founder Sir. Peter Scott got the idea of using a female Panda from the London Zoo as the logo for WWF.

As the black-patched eyes of the Panda looked very appealing and easy to draw with just black and white colors, the WWF decided to keep Panda in their logo since then.

Interestingly at birth, panda cubs are hairless and typically a size of a stick of butter. The mother panda carries the cub with her paws and cradles it on her chest.