Giant pandas in warm climates

[elefante]

It seems that a lot of zoos holding giant pandas are in warm climates; Washington, DC, Atlanta, Memphis, San Diego, Mexico City, and I'm sure some others. Seeing as how giant pandas are native to the mountainous regions of China, I've wondered how they do in these often muggy areas? Do they have large indoor areas? Do they swim? Or is panda habitat in the wild much warmer than I imagine it to be?

 

[SealPup]

They live as far south as Sichuan, there it gets quite warm. Warm, damp and subtropical in fact.

Climate in Sichuan, China

 

[elefante]

They live as far south as Sichuan, there it gets quite warm. Warm, damp and subtropical in fact.

Climate in Sichuan, China

Interesting. I always imagined them in cold, snowy mountains. Maybe they're as adaptable as American black bears. So that means takin are similarly adaptable.

 

[SealPup]

There will be microclimates in an area the size of Sichuan, thats just to illustrate pandas are found in the south, where the climate gets warmer than northern China. That and panda ancestors were tropical fauna to begin with, in association with tapirs and orangutans. So even in more northern areas of China, the pandas are relicts of the Pleistocene tropics at a time when bamboo forest was more widespread..

Encyclopedia of Human Evolution and Prehistory