Scientific Name: Ailurus fulgens
Family: Ailuridae
Superfamily: Mustelidae
IUCN Red List: Endangered
Height: 50 to 64 cm (20 to 25 in) – head to body (adults)
28 to 59 cm (11 to 23 in) – tail
Weight: 3.7 – 6.2 kg – Males
3 – 6.0 kg – Females
Description: The red panda has long, soft, reddish-brown fur on its
upper parts, blackish fur on the lower parts, and a light face with
tear markings and white badges similar to the raccoon. Each
individual can have distinctive markings. Its skull is roundish with
medium-sized upright ears, its nose is blackish & its eyes are
blackish. Its teeth are strong and healthy. Its long, bushy tail with six
alternating transverse ochre rings provide balance and
excellent camouflage in a habitat with moss and lichen-covered
trees. The legs are black and short with thick fur on the soles of the
paws. This fur serves as thermal insulation on snow-covered or icy
surfaces and conceals scent glands, which are also present on the
anus.A light faced red panda with tear markings and white badges similar
to the raccoon.
The red panda is specialised as a bamboo feeder with strong,
curved and sharp semi-retractile claws standing inward for grasping
narrow tree branches, leaves, and fruit. Like the giant panda, it has
a "false thumb", which is an extension of the wrist bone. When
descending a tree head-first, the red panda rotates its ankle to
control its descent, one of the few climbing species to do so.
Diet: Bamboo and may eat small mammals, birds, eggs, insects,
flowers, and berries. In captivity, they eat birds, flowers, maple and
mulberry leaves, bark and fruits of maple, beech and maple.
Trophic Level: Herbivore
Life Span: A red panda’s life span ranges between 8 – 10 years
(individuals are also found to live for 15 years).
- The red panda is endemic to the temperate forests of
the Himalayas, and ranges from the foothills of
western Nepal to China in the east. - Its easternmost limit is the Qinling Mountains of the Shaanxi
Province in China. - Its range includes southern Tibet, Sikkim and Assam
in India, Bhutan, the northern mountains of Burma, and in south-
western China, in the Hengduan Mountains of Sichuan and the
Gongshan Mountains in Yunnan. - It may also live in south-west Tibet and northern Arunachal
Pradesh, but this has not been documented. - The red panda lives between 2,200 and 4,800 m (7,200 and
15,700 ft) altitude, inhabiting areas of moderate temperature
between 10 and 25 °C (50 and 77 °F) with little annual change. - It prefers mountainous mixed deciduous and conifer forests,
especially with old trees and dense understories of bamboo. - Their presence was confirmed in spring 2007 when four red
pandas were sighted at elevations ranging from 3,220 to 3,610 m
(10,560 to 11,840 ft). - Its westernmost distribution is in Rara National Park.
- In 2018, red pandas were sighted at elevations of 3,150–3,650 m
(10,330–11,980 ft) in Nepal's Lamjung District. - The red panda is territorial.
- It is solitary except during the mating season.
- It is generally quiet except for some twittering, tweeting and
whistling communication sounds. - It is reported to be both nocturnal and crepuscular, sleeping on
tree branches or in tree hollows during the day and increasing its
activity in the late afternoon and early evenings hours. - It sleeps stretched out on a branch with legs dangling when it is
hot, and curled up its tail over the face when it is cold.
- It is heat-sensitive, and having the favourable temperature
between 17 and 25 0 C. - Shortly after waking, red pandas clean their fur somewhat like a
cat would, licking their front paws and then rubbing their backs,
torsos, and sides. - They also rub their backs and bellies along the sides of trees or
rocks. - Then they patrol their territories, marking with urine and a weak
musk-smelling secretion from their anal glands. - They search for food running along the ground or through the
trees. - Red pandas may use their forepaws alternately to bring food to
their mouths or place food directly into their mouths. - Predators of the red panda include the snow leopard (Panthera uncia),
mustelids, and humans. - If they feel threatened or sense danger, they may try to escape by
climbing a rock column or tree. - If they can no longer flee, they stand on their hind legs to make
themselves appear larger and use the sharp claws on their front paws
to defend themselves. - A red panda became a visitor attraction in Japan for his ability to stand
upright for ten seconds at a time.
- Red pandas are excellent climbers and forage largely in trees.
Like the giant panda, they cannot digest cellulose, so they must
consume a large volume of bamboo to survive. - Their diets consist of about two-thirds bamboo, but they also eat
mushrooms, roots, acorns, lichens, and grasses. - Occasionally, they supplement their diets with fish and insects.
- They do little more than eat and sleep due to their low-calorie
diets. - Bamboo shoots are more easily digested than leaves, exhibiting
the highest digestibility in summer and autumn, intermediate
digestibility in the spring, and lowest digestibility in the winter. - These variations correlate with the nutrient contents in the
bamboo.
- Red pandas process bamboo poorly, especially the cellulose
and cell wall components. - This implies microbial digestion plays only a minor role in their
digestive strategy. - To survive on this poor-quality diet, they have to eat the high-
quality sections of the bamboo plant, such as the tender leaves
and shoots, in large quantities, over 1.5 kg of fresh leaves and
4 kg of fresh shoots daily. - This food passes through the digestive tract fairly rapidly (about
2–4 hr) so as to maximize daily nutrient intake. - Red pandas can taste artificial sweeteners, such as aspartame,
and are the only non-primates known to be able to do so. - Red pandas are able to reproduce at around 18 months, and are
fully mature at two or three years. - Adults rarely interact in the wild except during mating.
- Both sexes (male and female) may mate with more than one
partner during the mating season from mid-January to early.
March. - A few days before birth of the young ones, females begin to
collect material, such as brushwood, grass and leaves; to build a
nest, which normally located in a hollow tree or a rock crevice.
- After birth, the mother cleans the cubs and can recognise each by
their smell. - At first, she spends 60% – 90% of her time with the cubs.
- After the first week, the mother starts spending more time outside
the nest, returning every few hours to nurse and groom the cubs.
- The cubs starts to open their eyes at about 18 days of age.
- By about 90 days, they achieve full adult fur and colouring, and
begin to venture of the nest. - They also start eating solid foods at this point, weaning at around
six to eight months of age. - The cubs stay with their mother until the next litter is born in the
following summer. - Males rarely help raise the young, and only if they live in pairs or
in small groups. - The primary threats to red pandas are direct harvest from the
wild, competition with domestic livestock resulting in habitat
degradation and deforestation resulting in habitat loss.
In India, the biggest threat is habitat loss followed by poaching,
while in China, the biggest threat seems to be hunting and - Although direct competition for food with domestic livestock is not
significant, livestock can depress bamboo growth by trampling. - Small groups of animals with little opportunity for exchange
between them face the risk of inbreeding, decreased genetic
diversity, and even extinction. - In addition, clearcutting for firewood or agriculture, including
hillside terracing, removes old trees that provide maternal dens
and decreases the ability of some species of bamboo to
regenerate. - In south-west China, red pandas are hunted for their fur,
especially for the highly valued bushy tails, from which hats are
produced.
poaching. - A 40% decrease in red panda populations has been reported in
China over the last 50 years, and populations in western
Himalayan areas are considered to be lower. - Deforestation can inhibit the spread of red pandas and
exacerbate the natural population subdivision
by topography and ecology, leading to severe fragmentation of
the remaining wild population. - Fewer than 40 animals in four separate groups share resources
with humans in Nepal's Langtang National Park, where only 6%
of 1,710 km 2 is preferred red panda habitat.
- In these areas, the fur is often used for local cultural ceremonies.
- In weddings, the bridegroom traditionally carries the hide.
- The "good-luck charm" red panda-tail hats are also used by local
newly-weds. - This practice may be quite old, as the red panda seems to be
depicted in a 13th-century Chinese pen-and-ink scroll showing a
hunting scene. - Little or no mention of the red panda is made in the culture and
folklore of Nepal. - In the past, red pandas were captured and sold to zoos.
- In an article appearing in the International Zoo News in 1969, one
reported he personally had handled 350 red pandas in 17 years. - Due to CITIES, this zoo harvest has decreased substantially in
recent years, but poaching continues, and red pandas are often
sold to private collectors at exorbitant prices. - In some parts of Nepal and India, red pandas are kept as pets.
- The red panda has a naturally low birth rate (usually one single or
twin birth per year), and a high death rate in the wild. - The red panda is listed as endangered in the IUCN Red List since
2008 because the global population is estimated at about 10,000
individuals. - Due to its shy and secretive nature, and its largely nocturnal
habits, observation of red pandas is difficult. - Therefore, population figures in the wild are determined by
population density estimates and not direct counts. - It is protected in all range countries, and hunting is illegal.
- It is listed in CITIES Appendix I.
- Worldwide population estimates range from fewer than 2,500 to
between 16,000 and 20,000 individuals. - In 1999, the total population in China was estimated at between
3,000 and 7,000 individuals. - In 2001, the wild population in India was estimated at between
5,000 and 6,000 individuals. - Estimates for Nepal indicate only a few hundred individuals.
- Reliable population numbers are hard to find, because other
animals have been mistaken for the red panda.
- One report from Myanmar stated that red pandas were still fairly
common in some areas; however, the accompanying
photographic proof of the "red panda" was a viverrid species. - Conservation efforts are highly variable between countries:
- China has 35 protected areas, covering about 42.4% of red
panda habitat. - India has 20 protected areas with known or possible red panda
populations in Sikkim, Arunachal Pradesh, and West
Bengal such as Khangchedzonga, Namdapha and Singalila
National Park, and a coordinated conservation policy for the red
panda. - In Nepal, known populations occur
in Langtang, Sagarmatha, Makalu Baran and Rara National
Park, Annapurna Conversation Area, Kanchenjunga National
Parks, and Dhorpatan Hunting Reserve. - Five protected areas in Bhutan support red panda populations.
- Myanmar has 26 protected areas, of which at least one hosts
red panda populations.
- In cooperation with the International Red Panda Management
Group, they coordinate the Species Survival Plan in North
America, the European Endangered Species Programme in
Europe, and other captive-breeding programs in Australia,
India, Japan, and China. - As of 2006, more than 800 individuals were kept in zoos and
parks around the world. - 511 individuals of the Himalayan red panda were kept in 173
institutions and 306 individuals of Styan's red panda were kept in
81 institutions. - Since 2009, the North American Red Panda Species Survival
Plan is coordinated at the Knoxville Zoo, which by 2019 had 110
red panda births; the most of any zoo worldwide.
- The Padmaja Naidu Himalayan Zoological
Park in Darjeeling successfully released four captive-bred red
pandas to the wild in August and November 2003. - The most often cited example of keeping red pandas as pets is
the case of former Indian prime minister Indira Gandhi.
- Pandas were presented to her family as a gift, and they were then
housed in "a special tree house". - There are two subspecies under the red panda species.
- One is the Himalayan Red Panda lives in the western part of the
red panda's range, namely in Nepal, Assam, Sikkim, and Bhutan. - Styan's red panda (A. f. styani) lives in northern Myanmar and
southern China. It is supposedly larger and darker in colour than
the Himalayan red panda, but there is considerable variation in both subspecies. Some individuals may be brown or yellowishbrown, rather than red.
- The Brahmaputra River is often considered the natural barrier
between the two subspecies, where it makes a curve around the
eastern end of the Himalayas, although some authors suggest A.
f. fulgens extends farther eastward into China. - The red panda is considered a living fossil and only distantly
related to the giant panda (Ailuropoda melanoleuca), as it is
naturally more closely related to the other members of the
superfamily Musteloidea to which it belongs - Fossils of the extinct red panda Parailurus anglicus were
excavated in sites from China in the east to Britain in the west. - The first known written record of the red panda occurs in a 13th-
century Chinese scroll depicting a hunting scene between hunters
and the red panda. - The red panda was recognized as the state animal of Sikkim in
the early 1990, and was the mascot of the Darjeeling Tea
Festival. - In 2005, Babu, a male red panda at Birmingham Nature Centre in
Birmingham, England, escaped and briefly became a media
celebrity, before being recaptured - He was subsequently voted "Brummie of the Year", the first
animal to receive this honour. - Rusty, a male red panda at the National Zoo in Washington DC,
similarly attracted media attention when he briefly escaped in
2013. - The name of the open-source Firefox web browser is said to have
been derived from a nickname of the red panda: "fire fox". - An anthropomorphic red panda was featured as Master Shifu, the
kung fu teacher in the 2008 film Kung Fu Panda, and its
sequels Kung Fu Panda 2 in 2011 and Kung Fu Panda 3 in
2016.
- The red panda Futa inspired the character of Pabu, the so-called
"fire ferret" animal companion, in the U.S. animated TV
series The Legend of Korra. - Jetstar Japan uses a red panda mascot character named "Jetta" (
ジェッ太). - An anthropomorphic red panda, Retsuko, is the main character of
the TV anime and Netflix original series Aggretsuko.