China Enjoying Baby Boom In Artificially Bred Pandas

FLORA AND FAUNA

A tiny panda cub.

by Staff Writers
Beijing (AFP) Nov 14, 2006
China is enjoying a giant panda baby boom thanks to the nation's artificial breeding program, with a record 27 surviving cubs born so far this year, state press reported Tuesday. A total of 30 pandas were born in China this year through artificial insemination, including 11 sets of twins, Zhang Zhihe, director of the China Giant Panda Breeding Technical Committee told Xinhua news agency.

Although three died shortly after being born, the number of new pandas this year is the most since Chinese biologists began artificially breeding the endangered species in 1960, the report said.

Twenty-six of the surviving panda cubs were bred by zoologists in southwest China's Sichuan Province, with 17 born at the Wolong Giant Panda Protection and Research Center and nine at the Chengdu Research Base, the report said.

The other surviving panda was born in neighboring Chongqing municipality, while a 28th was born in the US city of Atlanta after being artificially inseminated with the help of Chengdu researchers.

The famously sexually inactive giant pandas are among the world's most endangered animals.

Their traditional homes have been the mountains of central and southern China, with about 1,590 of the "living fossils" believed to be surviving in the wild and 180 being raised in captivity in zoos worldwide, Xinhua said.

Source: Agence France-Presse

FLORA AND FAUNA

Drunken Elephants Kill Three In India

Guwahati (AFP) Nov 14, 2006
Drunken elephants in India's northeast trampled three people to death, including a four year-old boy, and critically injured his eight-year-old brother, officials said Tuesday. The herd trampled the victims, who were all from the same family, Monday after guzzling rice beer in Teok Kathoni, a tribal village 370 kilometers (229 miles) east of Assam's main city Guwahati.

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