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Scientists to use satellite to peep on panda sex
(Reuters)
Updated: 2005-09-27 10:32
Chinese scientists will use satellite technology to peep on the sexual antics
of China's highly endangered giant pandas, Xinhua news agency said.
Male giant panda
Ping Ping and female panda Qing Qing mate in a wildlife center in Shaanxi
Province in this April 2004 file photo. [newsphoto]
| The $660,000 joint project between two Chinese and U.S.-based zoological
institutes would use global positioning (GPS) to keep an eye on giant pandas and
their mating behaviour deep in the wilds of a nature reserve in central Shaanxi
province.
"Tracking them with advanced technology and observing their sex activities
might help us find ways to avoid their extinction," Wei Fuwen, from the Chinese
Academy of Sciences' Institute of Zoology, was quoted as saying.
"Giant pandas are inaccessible for long periods of time and traditional
observation cannot unravel the ecological mystery of the animals."
Pandas in the wild are rebounding from the brink of extinction, but they are
not yet out of the woods, in large part because of great difficulties in
producing cubs.
Nearly 80 percent of female pandas were unable to get pregnant and 90 percent
of males were sterile, Xinhua said without elaborating.
Only around 1,600 of the animals are alive in the wild, mostly in the high,
fog-shrouded mountains of China's southwest Sichuan province.
More than 150 live in captivity.
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