Vanessa's Journal

Jan. 5

Today was a continuation of the “Vanessa-Lao Fan Wuyipeng panda feces tour.” This time we hiked to areas called Jinguashugou (Golden Melon Tree Valley) and Wanghouai (Overlooking Monkey Cliff).  We found another old trap from the 1980s panda trapping expedition. It was in a flat area right near a large river and seemed like a potential ‘panda grand central station’ kind of location.

It’s a good spot for us to put another trap, but again we looked far and wide around in that area for panda feces for hours and found nothing except panda feces from last summer and last winter at this time. The pandas had not come down there yet. They were supposed to be making their way over from the neighboring Hero Valley but are likely behind schedule due to the warm weather. 

I myself was so hot that I lost track of the season and thought for a moment like it was summer. I discussed with Lao Fan the humor in the fact that I had gone to great lengths to prepare for this winter field season by purchasing a heavy winter jacket and other winter gear as if I was going to Antarctica, and now I am sweating while my colleagues back in Michigan are experiencing record winter snowfall. 

We eventually accepted the fact that we were not going to find any fresh panda feces, despite finding lots of signs of red pandas, takin, Sambar, and tufted deer. We made our way back to the field station. Lao Wang and Lao Yang, who had been checking the traps today, had not returned yet. However, they showed up about five minutes after us with the news of fresh panda feces about 40 meters from the trap at Baiyan (white cliff).  Lao Fan and I were dumbfounded.  We had been hiking all over the place for two days trying to locate fresh panda feces and found nothing, while the two of them were just walking the every-day trap loop and stumbled upon it when they were not even looking for it. I love it when God has a sense of humor. 

It turns out that this panda’s droppings were slightly larger than what we found near another trap at Jianpengzi last week.  We aren’t sure, but it’s possible that this is a second panda that has wandered into our trapping area. So the rollercoaster debate of “Are there enough pandas around? Should we build more traps? Should we move to another area entirely?” continues. 

So I think this is the ‘new plan’ (which changes daily).  We are going to up the amount of meat at the Baiyan trap and put some along the trails there tomorrow.  We are still going to put up three new wooden traps in the near future, two at Jianpengzi and one in the Jinguashugou area I talked about earlier. The thought is that the pandas are slowly making their way over from Hero Valley (and the area even beyond Hero Valley) and we can corner them off in these areas when they get here. These traps also may help with the panda(s) that currently are in the area. In addition, four metal portable traps have been ordered from the nearest city and we are just waiting for news on their arrival (it may take a while). 

Fangzipeng is out for the moment because it is a complete ghost town, but we could always go back there in a month and reassess. Other areas are also probably out for the moment, considering the logistical complexity in that we would have to start all over and have no guarantees there either. I think Hero Valley is out for the moment as well, mainly because the only efficient way to get there is through a series of caves where knifelike icicles fall down unannounced on the heads of  unassuming people.  That is a serious accident waiting to happen.  And besides, if the pandas are passing through that area, they are coming here next. We will be waiting.