Introduction
Bamboo-eating bears, known as Pandas, are possibly the most loved animals in the world due to their soft fur, which is white and black. These bears are found in mountain regions of China but are depicted to have passive behaviour and a unique penchant for bamboo only. Most people know the feed of the other, stating that what will eat the other is a question that/one also poses to oneself about whether a panda is what one even. Pandas, although regarded as loveable pets, live in the wild and come across many dangers from Mother Nature and humans.
This article will delve into both aspects: exploring the predators that hunt or threaten pandas and the diet that bamboo pandas keep themselves. You will be well versed in the environmental factors affecting the Pandas, the threats they encounter, and the importance of the Pandas in restoring the equilibrium of their environment.
What Eats a Panda?
Despite their colossal size and appearance, pandas do face some natural sources of predation. Let us examine these five natural threats that potentially pose a great risk to the Pandas in their natural environment.
1. Snow Leopards
The snow leopard, a reclusive feline of snow-capped mountains, remains as one of a few big, seasonally active hunter who occasionally wishes to hunt pandas. Snow leopards are active hunters and are quick and strong enough to survive within the steep Harriman regions as well as the Tibetan plateau, where some of the pandas live or, rather, exist in central China at higher levels.
However, some members of the snow leopard species are known to hunt considerably larger prey than what would be expected. Though Pandas are not part of the snow leopards’ usual diet, a starving snow leopard may eye a baby or an injured panda as irresistible prey. Silent ambush predator style is remarkably advantageous considering the rugged mountain environments of pandas where snow leopards stalk their prey.
2. Leopards
Other possible threats to pandas include leopards, which are highly versatile and can be found virtually everywhere in Asia. These spotted big cats are good climbers and are at home in the wooded terrain, which the pandas prefer. Normally, leopards are inclined hunters of small animals, but whenever they come across a big animal, they attack it.
Usually, leopards are predators of panda habitats, with the pandas living in dense forests, making them more mobile. They are good at climbing trees and so can get close enough to observe or even hunt a panda at fairly close range. Newborn pandas or those who rarely move out due to sickness or injuries might be the target of the leopards.
3. Jackals
Unlike most bears, there are instances where even a panda bear clan has to endure jackals. This is especially true of panda cubs and weak pandas, as they are the most at risk. These mid-sized mammals are quite versatile, especially when it comes to their diet. In those geographical parts where the range of populations of jacks and pandas overlaps, jacks may take rest and turn into predators with their sights on baby pandas.
Jackals are social animals that bring down their prey in pairs or even nuclear families. If this hunting mechanism works particularly well, they would likely, as a group, attempt to overcome larger prey, for instance, a panda – mostly a young, old, or sick one. Additionally, they are intelligent and resourceful, which also makes them capable of taking advantage of every opportunity that may be presented to their prey.
However, the adult panda will be put aside as it is highly improbable that adult jackals will predate adult panda bears. The greatest threat will be from the young cubs that are yet to go out of the house. In the case of very young, helpless, and incapable of harming even special leaves, panda babies are at a very high risk for the first couple of months of their lives when they are dependent on their mother. For a jackal, or series of jackals, an unattended baby cub may appear to be an easy meal.
4. Birds of Prey
As strange as it may seem, big birds of prey can also be considered a danger to pandas owing to their hunting, even cubs or younger pandas. Species such as golden eagles and other large birds have been observed to prey on small mammals and sometimes even young plants or animals.
Golden eagles have very strong legs with an even wider wingspan and claws that are more talon-like, making them hunt and bring down animals that are bigger than they are. These birds can spot their target from afar, not with acute vision but with perfectly focused binoculars. Golden eagles are normally found in the higher mountaintops and are horizontally parallel to the mountain ranges where the brilliant monsters reside.
Such aerial predators may be a potential threat to a panda cub in a particular age range, for instance, during its first few months. There are also periods when cubs are small enough to fit inside the foot of a predatory bird. A fully grown panda may be way out of reach for size-thirsty mature eagles, yet the need to keep these flying assassins away from their youngsters is still on their minds.
5. Dholes
The Dhole, or the Asiatic Wild Dog as it is commonly referred to, is a subspecies of canine that lives in East and South Asia, including some regions that border and overlap the ranges of giant pandas. They are extremely social animals and possess intelligence that makes them effective hunters because they hunt in packs, which enables them to overpower animals that are much larger than them. Though pandas are rare kills for dhole packs, in certain conditions, they may seek out and kill even a panda, posing a threat mostly to young and sick pandas.
Dholes are persistent hunters and thrive in chasing prey. They are capable of running their quarry to greater distances, which makes the quarry too tired before they launch the final assault. This hunting tactic may work well against a panda, though large, but it is not made for quick runs or long-distance chases. More so, such a dhole hunting pack would be even more successful against a panda that has strayed away from the protection of thick bamboo bushes.
The threat from dholes is most prominent in offences against panda cubs. For the first couple of months after birth, native cubs do not have the skills to climb trees and escape or the means to defend themselves, which leaves them vulnerable if left unattended. On the contrary, mothers of pandas tend to be quite protective and do not leave their cubs unattended for prolonged periods during these critical times.
What Do Pandas Eat?
Moving on, having seen what eats the panda, we want to identify what the panda eats. Pandas are often depicted as having a very specialized diet; however, they are more diverse than most people understand. Let’s look into six of the main aspects of a panda diet.
1. Bamboo Shoots
One of the most famous pandas’ foods is bamboo shoots, and they are for a good cause, too. These small tender shoots form a large part of the panda diet, especially now in spring and early summer when they are most available. When we say ‘bamboo shoots’ here, it is the young stems of the bamboo plants above the ground, and, of course, pandas do love to eat them.
Its choice cannot be explained solely by a passion for this food among pandas but also by their way of gaining nutrients. New bamboo is more beneficial for consumption and digestion than tough bamboo. It is a fact that mature bamboo segments are richer in protein and contain fewer hard fibres than other segments. This makes them an ideal source of food for the pandas, which are more related to the carnivorous digestive system than the herbivorous one.
2. Bamboo Leaves
Even though bamboo shoots are eaten when available, the pandas feed on bamboo leaves most of the time. It is noteworthy that bamboo leaves are a significant part of the diet of adult pandas, especially during periods when there are not enough shoots. Today, pandas are considered specialized mammalian herbivores that feed exclusively on bamboo, and they have several unique characteristics that enable them to obtain as much energy as possible from this stiff, fibrous vegetable matter.
Probably, the most striking of these changes is an increase in the panda’s radial sesamoid bone, which acts as a pseudo thumb. It is this extra finger on their paw, in addition to the other five fingers, that enables them to grip and manipulate the bamboo stems amazingly. They deploy this pseudo-thumb to pull off leaves from the bamboo stalks in the most efficient way possible.
Pandas have well-developed jaw muscles and flat and broad teeth, which are well-suited for crushing and mashing bamboo leaves. Their digestion system is still closer to that of carnivores than most herbivores, but they take large quantities of bamboo. They have a sort of lining in their stomachs and intestines, and the microbes in their digestive tracts that assist in the digestion of hard plant parts.
3. Bamboo Stalks
Besides shoots and leaves, stems of the bamboo are also consumed by the pandas, even though they comprise the greater part of the diet during the winter when other parts of the bamboo plant are less available. The culms are the hard parts of the bamboo plant, and they are the stalks of the plant that can be used for various purposes. Although they are comparatively hard and not as nutritious as shoots or leaves, stalks are an important food source the rest of the time.
Bamboo eating techniques of pandas have reached a high level of evolution. With the ability to bite intensely, they can exert pressure on the outer cortex to get through the inner carers of the stalk. They generally employ the pseudo thumb and five fingers to grasp and take bites of the stalks and to use pulling motions to strip food parts. This is done as the panda advances up the stalk, and this makes up the rest of the steps of the process. This way of feeding is rather effective, and the pandas are capable of taking rather big portions of the bamboo in a rather short period.
This is because the pandas encounter some challenges in the consumption of bamboo stalks. The stalks aren’t Bruce as hard as the leaves; they are highly cellulose and lignified, which makes them completely inedible to any animal species. As a result of this, pandas have been put under pressure concerning the kind of food they need to take and, more so, the digestive system. It has a very strong mucosa in the stomach so as not to get splinters; it also possesses bacteria in its small intestine for the digestion of plant tissues.
4. Pikas
Even though 99% of a panda’s diet is bamboo, it is not a herbivore animal. Moreover, they add small mammals to their diet occasionally, and one of them is the pika. Pikas are small, rabbit-like mammals with pandas who share the same habitats in the Qinling Mountains in central China.
Pikas are not the primary diet of pandas but a potential food source and an occasional source of animal protein. Pikas are too fast and elusive to become prey for pandas, which are not chasing- or hunt-oriented; it was probably a burrow-invading panda or a pika that was sick or slow.
One of the facts that may draw parallels to the fact that pandas are carnivorous is their diet, that includes pikas. Although these animals have highly specialized morphology for the consumption of bamboo, they are classified under the order Carnivora and have some carnivorous digestive abilities. They are still able to break down meat even if they are not really into it because of their ancestors.
5. Eggs
Another item that is seen occasionally in the diet of the panda but is quite surprising at times is eggs. Although pandas remain root eaters almost exclusively, one has often noted a few opportunistic tendencies to find restaurants in the wild for themselves egg. Similar to the case of pika consumption, this behaviour reflects the ancestral past of pandas that goes back to cannibalism and exposes the variety of foods that they can consume.
Eggs are also rich in certain fats and proteins and form a good supply of those nutrients, which are usually lacking in the bamboo lowlands of the diet of the panda. Whenever a panda comes across a bird’s nest, it most probably makes use of this energy-dense food source. The eggs, in all probability, taken by the pandas are mainly those from ground-nesting birds inhabiting the forest where pandas are.
6. Fruits and Vegetation
In the case of a panda, although bamboo is the primary ingredient of its diet, certain bears do not hesitate to extend their dietary horizons to other forms of plants, such as fruits, which are one of them, and other vegetation. Such supplementary, although limited in degree, consumption of plant material is still quite important with regard to the overall nutritional value of the panda and provides useful information regarding foraging activities.
Panda diets are also reported to include fruits such as apples, peaches, berries, and nuts, which are indigenous to their environment. It is these fruits that have the sugars and various essential nutrients in quantities that mostly bamboo does not. Pandas generally seem to have a strong sweet tooth, which at least explains the consumption of fruit in season.
Pandas, more than fruits, also take other types of vegetation that they find in their forest habitats. This may be grasses, vegetative or normal vines, and leaves and bark of trees and shrubs that are not bamboo. Even though these plants constitute a tiny fraction of a panda’s diet, they are known to be of considerable nutritional significance.
Conclusion
In an overview of the panda’s position in the food chain, it is clear that these interesting bears have an important and intricate role in their environment. It is possible to come across potential attacks from snow leopards, leopards, and especially birds of prey. However, the major and most dangerous threats are human-induced destruction and fragmentation of the panda’s habitat.
On the other hand, they are also extremely unique in their dietary habit as they eat almost exclusively bamboo. Yet, as we’ve noticed, their food consumption pattern is not as straightforward as most people would imagine. By feeding on particular parts of the bamboo stalks such as stalks, shoots, and leaves, as well as swallowing small animals like pikas and birds’ eggs, and even consuming fruits and foliage, pandas seem to have an interesting range of diets despite being herbivores.
