(Xinhua)
Updated: 2007-11-12 14:20

CHENGDU - Giant pandas living in the wild may face food shortages as more bamboo plants, which comprise the bears' staple food, approach the end of their lifespan, Chinese naturalists warned.

A giant panda eats bamboo. Giant pandas living in the wild may face food shortages as more bamboo plants, which comprise the bears' staple food, approach the end of their lifespan, Chinese naturalists warned. [File photo]

Yang Xuyu, deputy head of the Wild Animal Preservation Station of the Sichuan provincial forestry bureau in west China, issued the warning on Sunday during the annual meeting of the China Giant Panda Breeding Technical Committee. The meeting was held in Chengdu, the capital of Sichuan.

Yang said that the station has observed 24,000 ha. of bamboo flowering in Sichuan, where 1,206 pandas live in 40 nature reserves with a total area of 1.77 million ha., accounting for 77 percent of the total panda habitat in China.

Bamboo blossoms have been spotted in 14 counties in Sichuan since 2005. Nine varieties of bamboo have been observed flowering. These varieties account for 30 percent of bamboo eaten by the panda, said Yang.

"No wild panda has been found dead of starvation. But as the area of bamboo flowering spreads, we should keep close watch on the severity of the pandas' food shortages," said Yang.

The mountainous region witnessed extensive blossoming of the arrow bamboo, the pandas' favorite variety, in 1984 and 1987, when the plants flowered, seeded and died. Hundreds of the endangered animals died of starvation.

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