Giant Pandas at BFX
Here we go, as I provide more video from the Ya'an Bifengxia panda base in SW China.
An upgrade to my video card that could better handle the HD video I had shot, has helped tremendously, thank goodness. I am amazed at how much upgrading in my video and computer equipment over the years I have taken on as technology is moving so fast anymore. Beyond HD, I won't be able to go any further, it is just getting too expensive for a hobbyist.
Have tried to show some of the uniqueness of the base and the little critters that we came across as we were observing the pandas. This base is located within the Wolong Reserve, which has tremendous variations in elevation with more then 4,000 species of plants. The forest has unique broad-leaf trees and the valley surrounding Panda Mountain keeps a beautiful, green landscape throughout the winter season. Would love to go back and do more exploring of the countryside.
Going in October was a good time. The weather had begun to cool off, with the temps in the 70's and yes rainy but it was more of a drizzle. Of course, this time of the year is beyond the breeding time for pandas, so you would need to go in the spring to experience it, but we did get to see some young cubs as you will see in the video.
We observed the different stages of care the newborn cubs receive in the nursery area. You will see the incubators that provide a warm environment for the newborns as they are not able to generate enough body heat on their own nor are their bodies able to remove excrement on their own so the keepers do this for them.
As you will see, the cubs in the video are older and just about ready to be moved into the kindergarten area. Each cub is fed a specialized milk formula that is prepared by the keepers and as they grow and develop they are moved into different areas of the nursery before graduating into the kindergarten where they experience the outdoors and begin learning new skills like climbing and eating bamboo.
I think the thing that struck me the most on this trip is how enthusiatic all of the staff members were at the bases. Constantly on the move engaging in many activies throughout the day to care for the pandas you can sense a great deal of pride in what they are doing. Always friendly and helpful if you had a question and willing to grab someone who could translate if they didn't understand you.
Enjoy the video, next time, I will show you how the famous 'panda bread' is prepared.
Panda disco [熊猫迪斯科]
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