Concerns are mounting that many wild giant pandas may die in Sichuan and Shaanxi this winter because of the destruction of food supplies and breeding grounds in the earthquake last May.
Unlike most bears, giant pandas do not hibernate, so they need an ample supply of bamboo to survive the winter. But the earthquake destroyed many bamboo forests and left some of the species' breeding grounds buried under mudslides.
According to Zhang Hemin , director of the China Conservation and Research Centre for the Giant Panda at Wolong, the damage was particularly severe at the foot of the mountains, where the pandas seek shelter in the colder months.
'In lower-altitude areas, there are acres of dead bamboo,' Professor Zhang was quoted by the Nanfang Weekly as saying.
The professor, who has spent more than two decades researching pandas in Sichuan, is one of the mainland's leading experts on the animals, and his assessment of the damage is the gloomiest of his peers.
'The earthquake's destructive impact on the panda population will exceed [that of] the calamity in 1983,' he said.