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Why does a panda chew bamboo 12 hours a day?

Imagine: you eat breakfast, then lunch, then dinner, and then lunch again — and so on for 12 hours straight! That's how a panda lives. It eats bamboo, bamboo, and more bamboo — up to 40 kilograms a day! That's like 200 large carrots.

And why so much? Here lies an interesting mystery. Once upon a time, the ancestors of the panda ate meat - they were real predatory bears. Therefore, the panda's stomach is still like that of a carnivore: short and not adapted to process plants. From bamboo, the panda gets only 17% of nutrients - the rest goes outside. A cow, for example, gets 60%. So the panda has to eat all the time to gain enough strength!

Nature has also helped the panda: on its paw there is a special "sixth finger". This is not a real finger, but a bone growth on the wrist. It works like a human thumb and helps to firmly hold bamboo stalks. Imagine how convenient - the paw becomes like our fist!

The black and white pattern of the panda is also not accidental. The black spots around the eyes make them larger - this scares away other pandas. The black paws and ears hide it in the mountain forests with shadows. And the white body - in the snow.

There are only about 1,900 wild pandas left in the world, and they all live in the mountains of China. A baby panda is born the size of a mouse — only 100 grams. 900 times smaller than its mother! And this is the funniest baby in the world.