Panda Camouflage Prepares Animals for Wild

Wearing panda costumes, zoo keepers at the Wolong Nature Reserve hide their human features to help cubs acclimate to the wild.

Published

8 months ago

Categories

Lifestyle

Topics

Seriously?

Places

China, Chengdu, Sichuan

Transcript

EDITORS NOTE: THIS EDIT CONTAINS CONVERTED 4:3 MATERIAL How do you coax a panda into a cage and prepare it for the wild? Dress like one. That's what staff at the Wolong Nature Reserve in China's Sichuan province are doing to lure two-year-old Taotao back into this crate before releasing the young panda into the wild. The zoo keepers smeared their costumes with panda feces and urine to hide any traces of human scent, avoiding interference from the mother by distracting her with bamboo. It's the last step of Taotao's months-long journey, which has aimed to prepare the two-year-old for his reintroduction into the wild. Meanwhile in the nearby capital of Chengdu, another panda mother celebrated the one month birthday of her twin cubs. Staff at that breeding facility have made it their mission to help populate pandas, which are now seen as coming back from the brink of extinction.