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(file photo)

 

Seven panda "villages" of between 10 to 20 pandas apiece have been found in northwest China's Qinling mountains, say experts.

 

"These panda recluses live in stone cave communities in the mountain," said Yong Yange, director of the research institute of Foping National Nature Reserve at the foot of the Qinling mountains in northwest China's Shaanxi Province.

 

The panda breeding caves are not unlike small villages with the black and white residents identifying which community a particular panda belongs to by smells, Yong said.

 

There's a social life in the communities but the pandas seldom seek contact with other "villages" except when they're looking for food, Yong explained.

 

The villagers keep their sons but shoo away their daughters, said Yong. Aged two female pandas are driven away from home to another "village" while sons grow up with mum and wait for the arrival of "the ladies" from another community.

 

"Marrying daughters to a remote area avoids inbreeding," Yong said. Young pandas compete -- lazily enough! -- to decide which one will have "the beauty" from another village.

 

According to Yong the mothers enjoy two types of cave apartment -- one bedroom with hall or just one big living room. All the caves are leeward and generally face due south or southeast.

 

A mother can't retain her home forever but must share with other villagers from the same community at different times, Yong said.

 

Further investigation is being carried out on the female outcasts and on how the villages develop new territories when there are too many ladies, according to Yong.

 

Yong's 16-member team has been researching 99 panda caves in the Reserve since 2004. Future investigations will concentrate on the structure of the stone caves. "If we can build new apartments for pandas like these caves we'll help mothers breed and increase the number of pandas in the wild," Yong said.

 

The Qinling Mountain giant pandas are a sub-species of giant pandas on the verge of extinction, explained Yong.

 

There are approximately 300 Qinling Mountain pandas and about 1,590 in the wild. They’re mainly in the high mountains of Sichuan, Shaanxi and Gansu. There are 160 pandas living in captivity around the world.

 

(Xinhua News Agency December 31, 2006)