Vanessa's Journal

March 2

Today I went to check cages with Lao Fan.  We didn’t have any animal sightings, but it was good for me to get out and see the giant panda signs that the team had spotted in the last few days.  I was amazed at the giant panda signs that they reported from February 28th, which came within about 30 meters from the first Baiyan trap.  A panda had started in an area perhaps near the Choushuigou (to the east of the field station) and then walked along the same trail that we usually travel on to go up through Baiyan. 

We could see the path that it blazed for at least 500 meters.  There were footprints in the snow along our trail here and there and there were also some spots where it stopped to feed on a bamboo stalk or deposit a dropping or two. 

Lao Wang was laughing at the fact that it appeared to eat every single leaf from one of the bamboo stalks that it foraged, which is rare for giant pandas, who are famous for wasting large amounts of bamboo. They will sometimes pick a bamboo stalk, only to eat a few bites and discard the rest, moving on to the next one.  This makes their feeding sites sometimes look like a tornado has gone through the area.

This panda that we encountered really did not seem to be in that mode.  Rather, it was in a traveling mode. It was likely moving a long distance in a short period of time and only stopped to feed when it had to. Giant pandas sometimes have these kinds of transition periods when they are moving between a winter and summer habitat and the mating season in particular is one that could also cause uncharacteristic amounts of movement. I think this panda is getting ready to position itself for the upcoming giant panda mating season and has come here earlier than some of its counterparts to scope out the area.  

We aren’t sure at this point exactly where this panda is now.  It had traveled such a great distance that its brief break in the area close to our Baiyan trap could have just been a pit stop before it continued on to a location that is not necessarily great for out trapping purposes. These kinds of activities are things we expected to encounter back in November/December when the pandas were supposed to be getting situated up here at Wuyipeng for the winter season, but for whatever reason, this year they decided to spend their time elsewhere and are arriving here months later than we expected them. 

Lao Fan was joking with me that they are all starting to come here now that they know we are leaving! However, I really don’t think the lack of giant pandas in this area this year is a human impact issue. I don’t think that the pandas have been staying away because of us.

This is especially true after today, when seeing evidence of giant pandas walking along the same trail that we all walk on every day and not appear to be too put off by what could be a “human odor” that we leave behind.  We don’t know why they have behaved so differently this year than in recent years and we hope that by putting GPS collars on them one day that we can help answer this question.