Efforts to save China's endangered giant pandas suffered another setback after the Sichuan earthquake. Less than 1600 pandas are thought to remain in the wild, with 249 pandas in breeding programs around the country. The
Wolong Nature Reserve, subject of National Geographic's adorable
Panda Nursery documentary and just 19 miles from the epicenter of the earthquake, was badly damaged. Five staffers were killed, and several pandas are still missing. Search teams have been sent out to locate the missing pandas, and several injured pandas have been
evacuated to the nearby Chengdu Research Base of Giant Panda Breeding as well as to zoos around the country. Though they now have enough water to give the pandas, local officials have said that they are short on food. "We are in urgent need of bamboos and apples."
Pandas International is
collecting donations for relief efforts at Wolong.
The Wolong Nature Reserve was started twenty years ago with six sick or starving pandas, and has grown to be one of the larger regional centers for panda conservation. In addition to being seen on National Geographic's Panda Nursery, Wolong and Chengdu are known for using '
Panda porn' to help some of their
pandas reproduce. Though most of the pandas were unharmed by the earthquake, the directors of the centers described them as being absolutely terrified and some of the baby pandas panicked, trying to climb the bars of their enclosures. Today, because of travel restrictions, the panda reserves are only getting a trickle of visitors - visitors who usually provide a large amount of their operating income. Last year, Director Zhang said, the center might receive as many as
5,000 visitors a day. Now, they often only see 20. As of right now, they have enough food left to feed the pandas for just
one week.
译文:
震后濒危大熊猫面临又一个挫折
四川大地震发生之后，保护中国濒危大熊猫的工作面临着一个新挫折。中国的熊猫被认为有不超过1600只在野生环境中，有249只处于繁育研究中。以
保育国宝大熊猫为主的
卧龙国家级自然保护区，与震中仅距19英里，遭到了严重的破坏。五名工作人员遇难，尚有数只大熊猫失踪。搜寻小组已被派遣去寻找失踪熊猫的下落。数只受伤的大熊猫已经被转
移至附近的成都大熊猫繁育研究基地和全国各地的动物园进行治疗。当地官员说现在虽然有足够的引用水供大熊猫喝，但是食物仍然紧缺。“我们紧需竹子和苹果。”
熊猫国际（美国知名公益慈善机构）正在帮助卧龙减轻这一问题而
筹集捐款。
卧龙自然保护区建立于20年前，为医救6只生病或者饥饿的熊猫。该区现在已经发展成为较大的熊猫保护区域中心之一。除了是保育国宝大熊猫的国家级基地，卧龙和成都也以“
熊猫A片”帮助
大熊猫繁殖而闻名。虽然大部分的熊猫未受本次地震的伤害，但是研究中心的管理人员说熊猫们已经完全受到惊吓，一些小熊猫非常惊慌，在试着攀爬它们圈舍的栅栏。现在，由于旅游的限制，熊猫保护区只迎来了零星几个游客——游客们通常是他们大部分营业收入的来源。管理员张先生说，去年该中心一天通常能接收
5000名游客，而现在他们每天常常只能看到20个。现在，他们剩下的食物只够喂养熊猫
一个星期。