Why do giant pandas like to eat bamboo? How many kilograms of bamboo do pandas eat in a day?

Everyone knows that giant pandas love to eat bamboo, especially bamboo shoots, because bamboo contains a lot of cellulose and lignin. They absorb nutrients from a large amount of fiber and need to digest a large amount of fiber and lignin every day. Do you know why giant pandas like to eat bamboo? How many kilograms of bamboo do pandas eat a day? What kinds of bamboo do giant pandas like to eat? Please open the following content to learn more!

Contents of this article

1. Why do giant pandas like to eat bamboo?

2. How many kilograms of bamboo do pandas eat in a day?

3. What kinds of bamboo do giant pandas eat?

Why do giant pandas like to eat bamboo?

The reason why giant pandas choose bamboo as their main food is that compared to other foods in the wild, bamboo is widely distributed, easy to obtain, and there are fewer competitors for food with giant pandas.

Giant pandas love to eat bamboo, especially bamboo shoots, because bamboo contains a lot of cellulose and lignin. They absorb nutrients from a large amount of fiber and have to digest a lot of fiber and lignin every day.

Bamboo shoots have the highest starch and hemicellulose content among all bamboos. Bamboo also grows very fast, with two seasons each year. The season when bamboo shoots grow is also the season when giant pandas are in heat and give birth. In this season, giant pandas give priority to eating bamboo shoots.

How many kilograms of bamboo do pandas eat in a day?

An adult giant panda needs to eat about 10-38 kilograms of bamboo every day, and the eating time is more than 13 hours a day. The giant panda also excretes more than 10 kilograms of feces a day. Because bamboo is low in nutrition, the giant panda can only eat continuously to maintain a balanced metabolism.

Giant pandas are not afraid of cold and dampness and never hibernate. They prefer to move around in damp places with humidity above 80%.

The food of giant pandas is low in nutrition and cannot store too much energy. In order to conserve energy, they will control activities that consume too much energy.

The giant panda lives in the upper reaches of the Yangtze River in China. It is a moisture-loving animal. The humidity where it lives is often above 80%, and the climate is warm, cool and humid.

What kinds of bamboo do giant pandas eat?

Common bamboos eaten by wild giant pandas include cold arrow bamboo, August bamboo, real bamboo, bamboo, bamboo, bamboo with few flowers, etc. The bamboos eaten by captive giant pandas are better, including Bashan wood bamboo, thorny bamboo, white nylon bamboo, bamboo with indigo leaves, March bamboo shoots, square bamboo shoots, etc. Giant pandas are omnivorous. For example, wild giant pandas occasionally eat animals such as bamboo rats.

An adult giant panda weighing 100 kg spends about 12-16 hours a day in spring eating 10 to 18 kg of bamboo leaves and stalks, or 30 to 38 kg of fresh bamboo shoots, and excretes more than 10 kg of feces to maintain metabolic balance.

Giant pandas survive almost entirely on bamboo. Among the more than 50 species of plants they eat naturally in the wild, bamboo accounts for more than half and 99% of their annual food intake.

Giant pandas spend most of their time sleeping, except for eating.