Giant pandas that become pregnant through artificial insemination are more likely to reject their newborn cubs than those that conceive by mating naturally. This finding could help conservationists further increase the number of giant pandas, which remain vulnerable.
As newborns, giant pandas (Ailuropoda melanoleuca) are helpless. They require near-constant body contact to keep a steady temperature, don鈥檛 open their eyes for six to eight weeks and need to be licked to stimulate urination and defecation.
鈥滱 newborn panda cub is completely dependent on the mother, and the mother won鈥檛 even feed or drink in the first few weeks after birth,鈥� says at PDXWildlife, a conservation charity in Oregon.
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Li and her colleagues examined mating data recorded between 1996 and 2018 at the Wolong Panda Centre and the Bifengxia Panda Base, both of which are in Sichuan province, China. This included observations on 202 cubs produced by 57 females, with 63 cubs born after artificial insemination and 139 born following natural mating.
The pandas that gave birth after artificial insemination were 37.9 per cent more likely to reject a cub compared with females that mated naturally. When a panda rejects a cub, she may ignore it, deny it body contact or refuse to nurse it.
Without any courtship, the mother panda can鈥檛 inspect the father of her children 鈥� sniffing him, listening to him, observing how he competes with other males 鈥� so cannot be assured of his quality, says Li. The mother is therefore less likely to invest in his massively time-and-energy-consuming offspring.
While snubbed cubs can be hand-reared by conservation staff, the researchers warn that this can cause trouble further down the line: missing out on the proper social learning interactions during the critical behavioural development period can lead to abnormal behaviours in adulthood, such as .
Li and her colleagues are now recommending that conservation programmes prioritise natural mating.
In 2016, giant pandas were reclassified from endangered to vulnerable by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), following population growth of nearly 17 per cent over the previous 10 years. At last count, there were 1864 pandas in the wild, according to from China鈥檚 National Forestry and Grassland Administration. There are also 633 pandas in captivity within panda centres in China and zoos around the world.
at conservation charity WWF in the UK, says the IUCN reclassification was a 鈥渟tep in the right direction鈥�, but doesn鈥檛 mean there are no remaining concerns. 鈥淰ulnerable species still have a high risk of extinction,鈥� she says.
鈥漇everal significant threats remain, including habitat loss and fragmentation, snaring and climate change, which is predicted to have significant impacts on the panda鈥檚 main food source, bamboo,鈥� says Loweth.
Applied Animal Behaviour Science
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