28 August 2010

My adoption pack has arrived (although i can't get the photograph to upload the right way round!) with information about the panda i have adopted. The panda is called Zhu Xiong (pronounced Ju-Shong) and she is 12 years old. She was rescued in 1999 when villagers contacted WWF with details of a disorientated panda in a goat shed. She was later released into the safety of the Wanglang Panda Reserve, if she ever wanders out of the reserve she can be identified via a tiny thread around her neck.

Zhu Xiong (which means 'bamboo bear' is the Chinese name for pandas) appears to be an elusive character (as wild pandas tend to be), she has not been seen since 2007 and hadn't been seen for five years before that!

Pandas are really in danger of being wiped out, a recent survey showed that there are approximately 1,600 in the wild, and even though this figure is 40% higher than expected, it is still desperately low.