Giant Pandas

1

Giant Pandas

Aleska, Michelle and Stephanie
2

Appearance

• Giant pandas are black and white bears. Their
  white faces and black patches around their eyes
  make them the easiest animals to recognize. The
  giant pandas ears, legs and shoulders are also
  black.

3

Adult Pandas

• Adult giant pandas are about 4 to 5 feet long
  and weigh about 200 pounds! The fur of a giant
  panda is thick to keep the pandas body warm and
  dry. The fur is about 2 inches long.

4

Where They Live

• Giant pandas used to live in many parts of
  China. Today, giant pandas live only in the
  bamboo forests in the mountains of southwest
  China.

5

What they eat

• Giant pandas eat bamboo. They can eat more then
  25 pounds of bamboo in one day! In one year, a
  giant panda may eat about 10,000 pounds of
  bamboo!

6

Bamboo

• Bamboo is not very
• nutritious. So, giant
• pandas must spend
• between ten and
• sixteen hours a day
• eating enough bamboo
• in order to stay strong
• and healthy.

7

Special paws

• The giant panda has very special front paws.
  Each front paw has a sixth finger, kind of like a
  thumb. This helps the panda pick up and hold the
  bamboo. Only human beings and apes can hold
  things in this way.

8

Baby pandas

• Female pandas may give birth to two babies at a
  time. But only one baby lives. This is because
  baby pandas are very small and helpless and the
  mother panda can only take care of one of them. A
  cub only weighs about 3 ounces and is about 6
  inches long.

9

Panda Cubs

• The cub has pink skin and some fuzzy white fur.
  Giant pandas do not have babies as often as some
  other animals. This is one reason why the number
  of giant pandas in the wild is becoming smaller
  and smaller.

10

Protecting pandas

• In 1900, there were about 65,000 giant pandas
  living in China. Today, there are less than
  1,000! The people of China are trying to protect
  the giant pandas. They have set aside large
  areas, called reserves, where giant pandas can
  live safely. Also, it is against the law to hurt
  or kill a giant panda.

11

• Special thanks to our fifth grade helpers
• Joselin,
• Kelin
• and
• Marlyn