A giant panda looks at the food offered by a breeder at the panda house in the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau Wild Zoo in Xining, capital of northwest China's Qinghai Province, Nov. 29, 2019. (Xinhua/Wu Gang)
During the colder months when some animals prefer to stay cozy inside, pandas are all about the cold and are very active in snow in a zoo in northwest China. Look at these adorable pandas, who think the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau's frigid season is a winter wonderland.
XINING, Dec. 2 (Xinhua) -- Four giant pandas can be seen playing at the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau Wild Zoo in northwest China, as they are adapting well to their first winter on the plateau.
The rare species native to warm and humid Sichuan Province in southwest China became the first pandas to settle down in the plateau city of Xining, capital of Qinghai Province, in June.
A giant panda eats bamboo during a snowfall at the panda house in the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau Wild Zoo in Xining, capital of northwest China's Qinghai Province, Nov. 29, 2019. Heating facilities will be used at the panda house of the wild zoo when the temperature is lower than minus 5 degrees Celsius in winter. (Xinhua/Wu Gang)
The panda house in the zoo is the largest of its kind in China. The zoo is open to visitors in winter.
Xining, with an altitude of over 2,260 meters above the sea level, has entered its coldest time of the year with the daily low temperature averaging minus 10 degrees Celsius.
However, the pandas do not just idle in their enclosures enjoying the luxuries of temperature control, floor heating and humidified air. During the day, they venture out rolling in the snow and digging for bamboo shoots buried in the snow by their keepers.
Two giant pandas eat bamboo during a snowfall at the panda house in the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau Wild Zoo in Xining, capital of northwest China's Qinghai Province, Nov. 29, 2019. Heating facilities will be used at the panda house of the wild zoo when the temperature is lower than minus 5 degrees Celsius in winter. (Xinhua/Wu Gang)
The keepers said the pandas have fully adapted to the climate on the plateau, and all their health indexes are normal.
Experts said the panda settlement on the plateau can help expand the species' adaptive range of living. Researchers will continue to follow their health conditions at high altitudes. ■