機(jī)智熊貓為改善生活 假裝懷孕

Panda may have faked pregnancy for more buns, bamboo

A giant panda slated to be the star of the first-ever live broadcast of the birth of panda cubs has lost the role -- after it was discovered the bear is not pregnant after all, Chinese state media reported.

Not only was it a phantom pregnancy, but zookeepers suspect the panda, Ai Hin, may have been faking it to improve her quality of life, the Chengdu Research Base of Giant Panda Breeding told Xinhua on Monday.

Ai Hin, age 6, had shown signs of pregnancy, including a change in appetite, moving less and an increase in progestational hormone in July, according to Xinhua.

But after almost two months, she began acting normally again, zookeepers said.

Experts say pandas sometimes carry on the behaviors associated with early pregnancy after noticing that they get preferential treatment, the news agency reported.

"After showing prenatal signs, the 'mothers-to-be' are moved into single rooms with air conditioning and around-the-clock care," Wu Kongju, an expert at the Chengdu base, is quoted as saying.

"They also receive more buns, fruits and bamboo, so some clever pandas have used this to their advantage to improve their quality of life."

The birth of Ai Hin's supposed cub and its progress in its early days, from its first cries to acquiring its distinctive black-and-white fur, were due to be broadcast online to panda lovers in China and worldwide.

Giant pandas are notoriously reluctant to breed in captivity and pseudo-pregnancies are common.

The female is fertile for no more than three days a year, and the time span for a pregnancy is from 80 to 200 days, according to the Chengdu base. Scientists will closely monitor behavioral and physiological signs, but it's often a guessing game.

Even if a pregnancy proves genuine, baby pandas have very low survival rates. According to the Chengdu base, only a third to a half of pandas born in Chinese captivity manage to survive past infancy.

There was good news last month, though, when a panda gave birth to a healthy set of triplets in China's Chimelong Safari Park in the southern city of Guangzhou. The cubs are thought to be the only living panda triplets in the world.

Edinburgh Zoo in Scotland thinks its panda, Tian Tian, could be the next to produce a cub, based on the latest scientific tests, but there are no guarantees.

"It is very likely that we will not know 100% if Tian Tian is pregnant until she gives birth," Iain Valentine, director of giant pandas for the Royal Zoological Society of Scotland, said earlier this month.

As few as 1,600 giant pandas survive in the mountain forests of central China, according to the Smithsonian Institution's National Zoo in Washington. More than 300 pandas live in zoos and breeding centers around the world, most of them in China.

相關(guān)內(nèi)容

一只大熊貓按計(jì)劃本能成為第一個(gè)被直播生產(chǎn)幼崽的明星熊貓，但沒能成功。因?yàn)槿藗儼l(fā)現(xiàn)這只熊貓根本沒有懷孕。

據(jù)官方的新華社8月25日報(bào)道，成都大熊貓繁育研究基地表示，這不僅僅是假想懷孕，動(dòng)物園管理員懷疑大熊貓“愛浜”為了改善自己的生活質(zhì)量而偽裝自己懷孕了。今年7月，6歲的“愛浜”表現(xiàn)出了一系列懷孕的癥狀：食欲變化、活動(dòng)減少，且孕激素升高。

但兩個(gè)月之后，它就表現(xiàn)得很正常了，動(dòng)物園管理員說。

專家稱，大熊貓有時(shí)注意到表現(xiàn)出早期懷孕癥狀就能得到更好的待遇時(shí)，它們就會(huì)裝作懷孕了，新華社報(bào)道。

新華社引用成都大熊貓基地專家吳孔菊(音)的話說，“一旦顯示出產(chǎn)前的癥狀，將要做母親的大熊貓就會(huì)被移到有空調(diào)的單間里，并享受24小時(shí)悉心照顧?！?

“這些懷孕的大熊貓能獲得更多的點(diǎn)心、水果和竹子。一些聰明的熊貓利用這一點(diǎn)來改善自己的生活質(zhì)量?！?

如果“愛浜”生出了幼崽，幼崽的早期生活，從第一聲啼哭到長出典型的黑白色皮毛，都本應(yīng)該在網(wǎng)上向中國和全世界的喜歡熊貓的人直播。

眾所周知，大熊貓不愿意在封閉的環(huán)境中產(chǎn)崽。所以偽裝懷孕的情況很普遍。

根據(jù)成都大熊貓基地的說法，雌性大熊貓一年排卵時(shí)間不超過3天，而懷孕的時(shí)間跨度則從80天到200天都有?？茖W(xué)家們緊密的關(guān)注著大熊貓的行為和生理特征，但很多時(shí)候還是碰運(yùn)氣。

即使一只熊貓真的懷孕了，熊貓幼崽的存活率也非常低。據(jù)成都大熊貓基地統(tǒng)計(jì)，在中國大熊貓基地出生的大熊貓只有三分之一到一半度過了幼年期。

不過上個(gè)月有好消息，在周國南部城市廣州長隆野生動(dòng)物園，一只大熊貓生出了健康的三胞胎。它們被認(rèn)為是世界上唯一活著的熊貓三胞胎。

根據(jù)最近的科學(xué)檢測，蘇格蘭愛丁堡動(dòng)物園認(rèn)為園中的熊貓?zhí)焯炜赡苁窍乱粋€(gè)要產(chǎn)崽的熊貓，但并不一定。

蘇格蘭皇家動(dòng)物學(xué)會(huì)的大熊貓專家伊恩?瓦倫汀(Iain Valentine)在本月初表示：“不到天天生崽之時(shí)，我們不能百分之百確定它懷孕了?！?

據(jù)在華盛頓的史密森學(xué)會(huì)的國家動(dòng)物園統(tǒng)計(jì)，在中國中部的山林里，只有1600只大熊貓存活。全世界共有300多只大熊貓生活在動(dòng)物園和大熊貓繁育中心里，大部分在中國。