Beautiful Red Panda

Red Panda Walking in Woods

Red Panda:

The Red Panda(Ailurus fulgens)is also known as the Red Cat-bear. A small woody mammal native to the Eastern Himalayas and Southwestern China. It is the sole member of it's genus Ailurus. It's diet mainly consists of bamboo, but it is an omnivore, eggs, birds and eats anything the woodlands provide. It's ability to eat bamboo rests with it's strong, curved, sharp claws.
A distant relative to the giant panda, there are no more than 10,000 matures left in the world, though it is protected by several countries. The decline of population is blamed on loss of natural habitat, and poaching. It also has a false thumb that is an extension of the wrist bone which aids tremendously in gripping things. They are typically shy creatures living a solitary life, except around mating season. Females give birth to one to four cubs usually in the spring and summer. Young pandas remain in their nest for about 90 days before venturing out on their own. The red panda had been previously classified as a relative of the raccoon and bear families (for obvious visual reasons) in the past but was found that this was not accurate. Though greatly smaller than their distant cousins, they are indeed panda bears.

Red Panda sitting on Tree

Characteristics:

The head and body length of red pandas measures 50 to 64 cm (20 to 25 in), and their tail is 28 to 59 cm (11 to 23 in). Males weigh 3.7 to 6.2 kg (8.2 to 14 lb) and females 3 to 6.0 kg (6.6 to 13 lb). They have long, soft reddish-brown fur on the upper parts, blackish fur on the lower parts, and a light face with tear markings and strong traumatic-dental features. The light face has white badges similar to those of a raccoon, but each individual can have distinctive markings. Their roundish head has medium-sized upright ears, a black nose, and very dark eyes almost pitch black. Their long bushy tail with six alternating yellowish red rings provides balance and excellent disguise against its habitat. The legs are black and short with thick fur on the soles of the paws. This fur serves as thermal insulation on snow-covered or ice surfaces and conceals scent glands which are also present on the anus. The red panda is specialized as a bamboo feeder with strong, curved and sharp semi-retractile claws standing inward for grasping of narrow tree branches, leaves and fruit. When descending a tree headfirst, the red panda rotates its ankle to control its descent, one of the few climbing species to do so.

Red Panda 

Habitats:

The red panda is endemic to the temperate forests of the Himalayas, and ranges from the foothills of western Nepal to China in the east. Its easternmost limit is the Qinling Mountains of the Shaanxi Province in China. Its range includes southern Tibet, Sikkim and Assam in India, Bhutan, the northern mountains of Burma, and in southwestern China, in the Hengduan Mountains of Sichuan and the Gongshan Mountains in Yunnan. It may also live in southwest Tibet and northern Arunachal Pradesh, but this has not been documented. The distribution range of the red panda should be considered disjunct, rather than continuous. A disjunct population inhabits the Meghalaya Plateau of northeastern India. During a survey in the 1970s, signs of red pandas were found in Nepal's Dhorpatan Hunting Reserve. Their presence was confirmed in spring 2007 when four red pandas were sighted at elevations ranging from 3,220 to 3,610 m (10,560 to 11,840 ft). The species' westernmost limit is in Rara National Park located farther west of the Dhorpatan Hunting Reserve. Their presence was confirmed in 2008. The red panda lives between 2,200 and 4,800 meters (7,200 and 15,700 ft) altitude, inhabiting areas of moderate temperature between 10 and 25 °C (50 and 77 °F) with little annual change. It prefers mountainous mixed deciduous and coniferous forests, especially with old trees and dense understories of bamboo.