Can The Panda Be Saved?

Captive Breeding in China has been a success. Now comes the challenge of easing them back into their native habitat.

- Jennifer S Holland

I CROUCH LOW IN THE GRASS TO GET A CLOSER LOOK AT THE animal lurching toward me. She’s about four months old, the size of a soccer ball, slightly bug-eyed, and no doubt soft and fragrant as a puppy. The urge to scoop her up and squeeze her is overwhelming.

That adorability is one reason the giant panda is an international sensation as well as a cultural icon and an economic gold mine in China. Now the whole world is watching China’s dogged attempt to keep pandas on the map—which in some ways has been an unprecedented success.

Like many species, giant pandas have declined as a growing human population has grabbed wild lands for human uses. But since 1990, when the species was labeled endangered, the Chinese have perfected breeding methods and built a captive population hundreds strong.

Whatever comes next in this bear’s conservation may decide whether the giant panda becomes a relic behind bars or roams free in the wild.

TO SATISFY THEIR LOVE for bamboo, which represents 99 percent of their food, giant pandas used to range across southern and eastern China and northern Myanmar and Vietnam. Now they’re found in patchy mountain habitat only in China, in perhaps one percent of their historic range.

The Chinese government’s most recent panda survey, from 2014, reported 1,864 in the wild, 17 percent more than in 2003. But Marc Brody, who founded the conservation nonprofit Panda Mountain, warns that it’s tough to trust any specific figures. “We mayy just be getting better at counting pandas,” he says.

In the meantime, the Chinese are furiously breeding their iconic bear in captivity. The early years (until the late 1990s) saw a lot of failed attempts, both at breeding and at keeping cubs alive.