Elusive Giant Panda | National Geographic

we’re here in China searching for wild
giant pandas that’s right
wild pandas you may have seen pandas in
zoos they’re one of the most popular
animals in captivity but have you ever
seen pandas living where they really
live they live here about 5,000 feet in
the remote mountain forests of central
China giant pandas are solitary
creatures many times the only reason
they know that other pandas are around
is because of the scent marks they leave
pandas rub their scent glands on the
bamboo trees and then other pandas
sniffed the trees to find out who’s
around and if the other party is
interested in mating pandas eat bamboo
lots of bamboo up to 40 pounds a day
this panda looks like he’s chewing down
a pool cue huffing up certain times of
the year they eat the leaves other times
they eat the stalks your average 275
pound panda spends up to 14 hours a day
eating the rest of its time sleeping
oK we’ve saved the best for last shots
of the reclusive giant panda are rare
but the rarest of the rare are these
shots a mother in her den cradling her
newborn panda baby the mother proudly
won’t leave this den or eat for 25 days
while she takes care of this helpless
young one want to hear what a baby panda
sounds like in a year the cub will
become semi independent but it will
stick around mom for up to 18 months
giant pandas are one of the rarest
animals in the world even though more
than 600 were recently discovered there
are only about 1,600 total in the wild
in a way they’re too cute for their own
good so we keep putting them into zoos
to protect them from poachers as well as
from habitat destruction
but now greater efforts are being made
to see that wild pandas are able to live
and thrive in their Chinese mountain
homes