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Zoo to Pandas: Bamboo for You
Chuan Chuan, 20, a male giant panda, lives with his 3-year-old son, Le Le, at the zoo. Giant pandas consume 125 to 150 kilograms of bamboo each week and will only eat fresh, green and tender bamboo.
In recent times, securing a steady and adequate supply of bamboo has a challenge for the zoo. The zoo now receives its bamboo from Gongqing Forest Park in northeastern Yangpu District and an entertainment park in suburban Qingpu District.
Yet the Qingpu park experienced a bamboo shortage last summer, prompting zoo officials to look elsewhere, too.
Now the zoo will earmark 50,000 yuan (US$6,030) per year to buy feed in a stepped-up efforts to protect one of the world's most endangered species, a zoo spokesman said this week.
Liu Xiugang, a farmer in Shanghai's Xinzhuang District, has planted bamboo on a 5.3-hectare plot that neighbours his residence. That should provide 250 tons of bamboo to the panda in a daily basis in three years.
By the second half of this year, the land is expected to begin supplying bamboo. Next year, the quantity will increase, paving the way for a steady supply in three years.
"The land will become the feed base for animals of the zoo, mainly for panda,'' said zoo spokesman Chen Guoliang. "A contract has been signed with Liu to deliver the bamboo for daily uses.''
"I am so relieved that Chuan Chuan and Le Le now can have enough to eat,'' said Jiang Qinyan, a 12-year-old student and frequent panda visitor. "I want them to grow up well, just like me. I don't want to lose them.''
The rare giant pandas -- only about 1,000 exist in the world and most are in Southwest China's Sichuan Province -- are popular zoo attractions. The feed shortage even led one devoted panda fan, Shanghainese Su Huiying, to make five deliveries of bamboo from her private yard to the zoo, hoping even the small number of bamboo can help.
"Pandas are human beings' best friends,'' Su said. "I will try everything I can to help them.'' Even foreigners joined in. Peter Clark, an artist in the United States, delivered US$120 to the zoo when he learned of the problem during a stay in Shanghai late last year.
www.chinadaily.com.cn
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