European Stars And Stripes (Newspaper) - October 8, 1988, Darmstadt, Hesse                                Magazine i a Hub he Mai rifts Over saving the Panda by Kathy Wilhelm associated press scientists and conservationists who rallied to save Tho rare giant Panda when its Lavonte Lood ran ou1 Are sharply divided Over what to do next. The world wildlife fund a conservation group and China s main foreign partner in Panda research recently turned to the . Courts to determine in chinese Panda Loans to american zoos Are exploitative As it says or educational As China says. Some chinese and Western experts say China should do More to Breed captive pandas while others say the Only solution is to move humans from Panda reserves. Even the size of the Panda population is under debate. The world wildlife fund is preparing to release Survey results that put the number of pandas in the wild at 1,100 to 1.500. Startlingly higher than previous estimates a1977 chinese Survey put the figure of 1,000, and the population is known to have dropped since then due to poaching and a shortage of the Panda s favorite food Bamboo. Ken Johnson a University of Tennessee zoologist who led the Survey says the earlier count was Sloppy and too conservative. But Zhou Shouder the Deputy director of China s largest Panda Reserve the 800-Square-mile Wolbong nature Reserve near Chengdu in southwestern China discounted Johnson s figures which were based largely on a count of Panda nesting areas and droppings. The experts agree however that the Panda is steadily decreasing in number and that live years after an International Alert went out to save it the Outlook is grim. There arc More pandas than we expected Johnson says but they Are More critically endangered  pandas Black and White boar like animals that some say Are related to the Bear and some say to the Raccoon Are native Only to China. Experts believe their ancestors lived 20 million years ago contemporaries of the Mastodon and other extinct species. A few Hundred years ago pandas still roamed the lowlands. But humans gradually pushed them into the mountains of Western China s Sichuan Ginsu and shaan i provinces the Only places they now live in the wild. World attention was drawn to their plight in 1983 when their dietary Staple Arrow Bamboo flowered and did Asil does every 40 or More years. The world wildlife fund collected More than $4.1 million toward saving he animal and the chinese government and citizens contributed millions More. More than 62 animals starved before the Bamboo began growing again a Lew years later. That crisis Over experts Aie looking More critically at China s conservation program they acknowledge China s limited resources Praise its Good intentions and press for More action without agreeing on the Best course. Except for the pandas there s not a lot that s Black and Whilo about in said Ken Cook a spokesman for the world wildlife fund. China is dolling sternly with one obvious problem poaching. Its highest court last year ordered Panda killers be Given Long prison terms or even the deals sentence. China has been less decisive however in dealing with another human problem Ordinary peasants. Their encroachment on Tho rare animal s turf including inside China s 12 Panda reserves advances steadily. More than 4.000 peasants live in Wolbong which became a showcase for Panda conservation in 1980 when the world wildlife fund helped build a Breeding Center there. The peasants terraced Corn and potato crops climb High up Tho slopes of mountains roamed by pandas. Johnson believes the peasants must be moved it not trom Wolbong Ihen irom other reserves they be already destroyed Wolbong  he says. Human settlements have marooned the pandas in Small groups on Mountain tops preventing them from mingling in the mating season and creating the danger of localized inbreeding he says. Johnson s solution is to move humans from critical areas and Plant corridors of Trees and Bamboo Between Panda habitats so they can roam freely and two orphaned pandas play i by Fredn at Tho Wolbong  in China Sec fenian province. Saturday october 1988 mate naturally something to said pandas have no trouble doing in the wild chinese officials while agreeing in theory show no signs of acting. Wolbong s Deputy Diro Clor Zhou says he tries to educate the peasants in the Hopo they will Olavo voluntarily but he has no Fallback plan in they Don t. Johnson dismissed Breeding centers arli Ocial reproduction and chinese Elloris to develop test tube pandas saying we Don t have that much time however other so lentils be Liova wild pandas cannot be saved in adequate numbers and thai Breeding centers Are needed to repopulate the forests. Hero too. China s program Falls Short. You need one person who knows exactly where All the pandas Are and their histories says Devra Kleiman ass Island director of research Al Washington s National zoo. Captive pandas kept mainly in pairs in zoos. Should instead be kept in Large Breeding coolers where they would have greater chances of finding compatible males she says. At a minimum she adds zoos should cooperate in Breeding their pandas. William Conway director of the new York zoological society and designer of the Wolbong Breeding Center agreed on the need for iwo or three National Breeding centers where pandas could to carefully managed in an accelerated propagation program. But chinese zoos cooperate Little. The forestry ministry in charge of conservation said it does not even keep count of How Many pandas Are in Captivity in China. Official Media reports say there Are More than 60. Wolbong i Leighl captive pandas puts Malos and females together Only Tor the Brid Spring mating season As do Many zoos. Then relative strangers and unable to act out Ihler elaborate mating rituals of the wild the pandas arc notoriously uninterested in Romance. According to chinese count captive pandas worldwide have produced fewer than three dozen surviving cubs. I Don t think anyone is pleased with the Progress that has been made in captive Breeding Cook says. He said the Iund was disappointed that the Breeding facility it helped build in Wolbong had Only produced one Panda turn in 1986. Wang Menghua of the forestry ministry says Breeding has suffered trom too Little equipment and trained stall. But he says China s efforts compared Well with other countries noting that few Western zoos with pandas have been Able to produce surviving olt Spring. It was Breeding and Money that dragged the Panda into the us courts. In a suit still pending the world wildlife fund and american association of zoological Parks end museums accused the . Fish and wildlife service of allowing commercial exploitation of pandas on loan to . Zoos from China. Six . Zoos have borrowed separate pairs of pandas for Short periods paying China up to $500.000 and in turn reaping millions in ticket and Concession sales. Dozens of other zoos Are hotly competing for pandas. Our concern was that the number of Loans was increasing sharply Cook says. The stars and stripes Page 13