disappeared: Human population growth and expanded human settlement have squeezed the panda into increasingly smaller and more fragmented areas. In addition, pandas prefer to forage in bamboo thickets that are in heavily forested terrain. As more and more trees are cut to supply needed timber (even in reserves, where many people live), both shade and protective cover are depleted and the pandas seek new sources of food, abandoning even plentiful supplies of their favorite bamboos. But sometimes there is nowhere for them to go.
The need for bamboo is imperative in order to save the pandas. Each panda must find 40 pounds of bamboo to eat every day. Bamboo belongs to the grass family, which includes everything from the grasses that cover suburban lawns to grains such as wheat, rice, and corn, produce plants such as sorghum and timothy, and even sugar cane. There are more than 200 bamboo species, and they range from sea level to altitudes exceeding 10,500 feet. Like many grasses, most bamboo have blade-like leaves and round, hollow, jointed stems. Unlike those of typical grasses, bamboo stems are woody and may grow as tall as trees. Occasional specimens have measured 120 feet high and three feet around.
Bamboos reproduce via vigorous, underground stems from which new shoots grow. Young shoots of tropical species may gain as much as a foot in a single day, and some people say they can actually hear these varieties growing. In colder climates, bamboo grows much more slowly. One species found in China's Woolong Natural Preserve - the site of intensive panda field research - attains a height of only four inches after a year and takes 10 to 15 years to reach its full height of about seven and one-half feet. Periodically, bamboo reproduces not by sending up new shoots but by flowering and pr
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