(August 17, 2014 at 8:02 pm)Chad32 Wrote: You don't think their sexual appetite has degraded? Then why do you think they've lived for so long when they're dying off now?
As I understand it, they are inefficient and very particular vegetarians that relies on free migration over large natural range to find and eat large amount of right kind of bamboo to survive. Bamboo has a way of flowering all at once over a large area and convert themselves into a form inedible to pandas. Previous pandas would move to a new area. But with their natural range extensively reduced and fragmented by human development, they can't migrate anymore to avoid bamboo flowering season.
Basically, pandas are anatomical carnivores that has for some reason adopted themselves, very poorly, to an almost pure vegetarian diet. Their digestive systems are designed for meat and can't pull much nutrients out of plants. They need to eat the right kinds of bamboo almost constantly to ensure they can get all types of nutrients they need. If they can't have the right kind of bamboo in the wild, they can eat all day long and still die of malnutrition.
