The next widespread bamboo flowering poses a massive risk to the giant panda

Zhaoxue Tian, Xuehua Liu*, Zhiyong Fan, Jianguo Liu, Stuart L. Pimm, Lanmei Liu, Claude Garcia, Melissa Songer, Xiaoming Shao, Andrew Skidmore, Tiejun Wang, Yuke Zhang, Youde Chang, Xuelin Jin, Minghao Gong, Lingguo Zhou, Xiangbo He, Gaodi Dang, Yun Zhu, Qiong Cai

*Corresponding author for this work

    Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

    20 Citations (Scopus)
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    Abstract

    The IUCN Red List has downgraded several species from "endangered" to "vulnerable" that still have largely unknown extinction risks. We consider one of those downgraded species, the giant panda, a bamboo specialist. Massive bamboo flowering could be a natural disaster for giant pandas. Using scenario analysis, we explored possible impacts of the next bamboo flowering in the Qinling and Minshan Mountains that are home to most giant pandas. Our results showed that the Qinling Mountains could experience large-scale bamboo flowering leading to a high risk of widespread food shortages for the giant pandas by 2020. The Minshan Mountains could similarly experience a large-scale bamboo flowering with a high risk for giant pandas between 2020 and 2030 without suitable alternative habitat in the surrounding areas. These scenarios highlight thus-far unforeseen dangers of conserving giant pandas in a fragmented habitat. We recommend advance measures to protect giant panda from severe population crashes when flowering happens. This study also suggests the need to anticipate and manage long-term risks to other downgraded species.

    Original languageEnglish
    Pages (from-to)180-187
    Number of pages8
    JournalBiological Conservation
    Volume234
    DOIs
    Publication statusPublished - Jun 2019

    Bibliographical note

    Copyright the Author(s) 2019. Version archived for private and non-commercial use with the permission of the author/s and according to publisher conditions. For further rights please contact the publisher.

    Keywords

    • Scenario analysis
    • Massive bamboo flowering
    • Risk pattern
    • Giant panda
    • Qinling Mountains
    • Minshan Mountains

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