I have a wildlife zoo-Chapter 648 - 647: Bamboo Flowering

After the cake was cut, the quiz activity began!

Explainers were spread out at different locations in the venue, each surrounded by a crowd of tourists.

After explaining the game rules, the quiz started with the question, "When you look at pandas in our zoo, do you notice they aren't as black and white as the pandas in your imagination, and they seem not very clean? Do you know why that is?"

Some tourists had a conflicted expression as they pondered over the question, while others quickly raised their hands!

Liu Xueqing's eyes lit up; she knew the answer to this question because she had heard an explainer mention it on a previous visit.

However, she was a beat too slow to raise her hand.

The explainer scanned the crowd and pointed to a girl waving her hand back and forth, smiling and saying, "Girl in the yellow clothes, you answer it!"

The girl had eagerly raised her hand earlier and only started to think now. After contemplating, she answered, "Could it be a matter of personality? Maybe like humans, some pandas love to be clean while others are messier. The pandas that appear on camera are the clean ones."

The explainer shook her head, "That's not right~"

"It's not?"

The girl wasn't too disappointed since she had just taken a wild guess.

A boy in blue said, "Maybe it's because pandas are too lazy, so they don't like to bathe?"

"That's also not correct!"

"Eh?"

The boy scratched his head in confusion, apparently having been quite confident in his answer.

"Pandas can't lick their backs with their tongues!"

This 𝓬ontent is taken from freeweɓnovel.cѳm.

"Because animal keepers don't give them baths!"

"Hahahaha!"

At this answer, everyone burst into uncontrollable laughter.

Liu Xueqing replied, "Because having a bit of dirt on their fur is good for pandas' health; it's a natural protection that prevents parasites! Being too clean can actually decrease their immunity, so they aren't bathed frequently."

The explainer smiled, "That's the correct answer! Here's a raffle ticket for you. Does anyone else want to add anything?"

"Oh~"

"Quack quack~"

The nearby tourists all started to applaud.

A man in the crowd said, "Because that's the natural state of pandas. They roll around in the soil and get dirty."

Some thought this was stating the obvious, but surprisingly, the explainer nodded in agreement with the answer!

Everyone was amazed.

"That's correct! Whether it's pandas or lions and tigers, they don't live for humans. Being a bit dirty and covered in soil may not look nice to us, but their natural state is the best one for them."

At that moment, Yingying was eating cake by the glass curtain wall, staring unblinkingly at the pandas; Yingying's father conveniently crouched down to hold the cake for her.

While others had small pieces, Yingying's plate had a huge slice with a complete panda-shaped cream decoration on top.

Due to Fang Ye's instructions, the volunteers had specially cut a bigger piece for her.

There were still quite a few people watching the pandas. After Liu Xueqing got the raffle ticket, she didn't hurry back to find Yingying and the others. Instead, she began to wander around the panda exhibit on her own!

Upon reaching the upper level of the panda exhibit, she suddenly heard a familiar tune.

A gentle and kind woman's voice softly sang:

"Umbrella bamboo flowers bloom; Mimi lies in her mother's arms counting the stars.

"Stars, oh stars, how beautiful you are, where's tomorrow's breakfast going to be?"

Hearing this song, Liu Xueqing felt as if she had returned to her childhood!

When she was little, her mother used to sing her to sleep with this song, and in the blink of an eye, she now had both elder and younger generations to care for.

She couldn't help but walk towards the direction of the song.

Fang Ye was surrounded by people at that moment, and he was the one playing the music.

Many older visitors showed a nostalgic expression upon hearing it, and some even followed along, humming softly.

"Mimi, oh Mimi, please believe that we haven't forgotten you.

The high moon hangs in the sky, tomorrow's breakfast is deep within my heart."

These were the beautiful memories of a generation.

Younger visitors, although they had never heard it before, were also drawn by the song's beautiful and gentle melody, listening quietly.

When the song ended, they all started to exclaim.

"Back then, many pandas starved because the bamboo blossomed, and that's the background to this song!"

"Public service songs from the past were really nice to listen to, weren't they?"

"When I was little, my mother didn't explain it clearly, I thought it was about a person. Poor Mimi, it was only when I grew up that I realized it was about pandas."

"I cried the first time I heard it."

Fang Ye smiled and said, "Everyone must have heard this song before, right? Those who haven't, must have at least heard the story of the bamboo blossoming.

In the 1980s, many nature reserves experienced the phenomenon of mass flowering and dying of umbrella bamboo. Umbrella bamboo is the main food source for giant pandas, and the pandas faced a crisis of food shortage, putting their survival at risk.

"Stars, oh stars, how beautiful you are," at that time, no one knew how many wild pandas like 'Mimi' were out there, unsure where tomorrow's breakfast would come from.

The 'Urgent Report on Saving the Giant Panda' mentioned that due to the mass death of umbrella bamboo, many pandas died, and 138 carcasses were found upon investigation.

According to descriptions by rescuers at the time, hungry pandas could only drink water from the rivers, and many were inflated to death this way. There were also many pandas on the brink of starvation that ran into villagers' homes, eating anything edible they could find, even sheep.

After it was reported, it caused a significant response. A vigorous movement to save the giant pandas was ignited domestically, including great support from the international community."

"Oh dear, that's so sad."

"Thank goodness they were protected, or else we wouldn't be able to see these adorable pandas today."

Fang Ye added, "However, the plight of the pandas at that time actually had little to do with the blossoming of bamboo!"

The tourists were shocked when they heard this, as it was different from what they had previously understood!

"Really? Is that true?"

Fang Ye explained, "The 'Classic of Mountains and Seas' records: 'When bamboo flowers, it withers within the year'.

Bamboo flowering is a normal natural phenomenon. Most bamboo species flower every 15 to 120 years, and they die after flowering.

There is a certain cyclical nature to bamboo flowering, where large patches of bamboo die simultaneously.

However, giant pandas usually feed on more than thirty types of bamboo, and if umbrella bamboo flowers, there are other types they can eat; it's not as though all different types of bamboo would flower at the same time.

Actually, if you think about it, giant pandas have survived for millions of years, and in that time, bamboo has flowered countless times.

If they were really to die off en masse due to a single flowering event, such a fragile species unable to withstand setbacks would have disappeared in the long stream of history and not appear before us today.

Every species that has survived to the present is a strong contender that has withstood the tests of nature, incredibly resilient!"

Liu Xueqing couldn't help but ask, "If it wasn't the flowering of bamboo that caused pandas to starve, what was the reason for it?"