Vanessa's Journal

Jan. 6

Today, while Lao Fan and Lao Yang were checking traps, I worked a little bit on a new mini-project that I’ve started. I’m reading a book recently published that documents the Third Giant Panda Census.  It was an extensive survey of the entire giant panda range that had the goal of trying to figure out just how many pandas are out there. The last survey was in the 1980s, so we were all in need of an update on the status of the species.  Mainly they used panda droppings (feces) as signs of pandas and different sizes of the feces to differentiate between individuals.  I will find out just how they arrived at the magic number of a total of 1,596 pandas existing in the wild. 

It’s a good book and I’m learning a lot as I go. It’s a little slow because it’s 300+ pages and it is all in Chinese, but I’m doing better than I thought I would at it. Right now I’m on Chapter 2. I’ll try and share little pieces of information that I find new and interesting as I go. 

In the afternoon, I hiked down the mountain.  I have some meetings and random errands to do in town tomorrow.