It's All About Bamboo and Poo (part 1)
Tuesday, 27 July 2010 15:33
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Hi guys
Well, this cooler weather is certainly keeping us keepers busy over here on Pandas, as it has meant Wang Wang and Fu Ni are up and about a lot more than in summer. This is particularly true for Wang Wang who is moving around all the time. Over the past 8 months of working with Fu Ni we have discovered that our little princess is also our “lazy” panda!......or it may be that Wang Wang is just a very active one…we are all still trying to work it out!
Along with the increased activity levels comes an huge increase in the amount of bamboo that the pandas are eating. This is great news as they seem so happy all the time... all they seem to do is eat!!!! I don’t think it is such a bad lifestyle. We are putting in around 20 kilos of bamboo in every night and during the day, depending on what species they are eating, we may put in at least another 10kilos - that is a massive 30kilos for each of them!!!!
One thing I have to mention is something that I have picked up from doing our VIP tours. I get a lot of visitors that are very surprised when they learn that the pandas don’t eat everything we give them. If we put in 20 kilos of bamboo in at night time we are really pleased if we take out say 8 kilos in the morning. This is because the pandas vary with what they eat constantly throughout the day. We feed out on average 5 different species everyday and in the morning they may be eating the leaf of one species, by lunch they could be eating the culm of another on and by the night feed they could be onto both the leaf and the culm of a totally different species! They certainly keep us on our toes and guessing!
Recently we received large amounts of bamboo from the Botanic Gardens as they were harvesting, clearing and giving all their bamboo a good tidy up. It was great and the pandas loved it (thanks guys!). They gave us all different species of bamboo that Wang Wang and Fu Ni had never tried before and most of the species they loved! Hopefully this friendship can continue in the future and whenever they need to cut their bamboo the pandas can get it. It seems that both parties really benefit from this one - Botanics get to easily dispose of large amounts of “waste” and we get to give the pandas new varieties of bamboo species.
All of this is great but what goes in must come out!!!! Stay tuned to learn all about panda poo...
Simone
written by carleena, August 06, 2010
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I saw Funi run in her enclosure one day when I was visiting and could not believe how fast she was moving for such a big animal. I agree the pandas are certainly more active in the winter. It's great to hear they are getting a variety of bamboo and enjoying it.
cheers
Brenda