Caretakers at Shanghai Wild Animal Park in Pudong district have lived in the park since close-loop management was imposed there in mid-March and taken measures to ensure that the pandas are not infected by the virus. (PHOTO PROVIDED TO CHINA DAILY)
The latest COVID-19 outbreak in Shanghai has disrupted many aspects of daily life, including food supplies.
It isn't just local residents who are trying to get their necessities through group purchases or government handouts, even the creatures at Shanghai Wild Animal Park in Pudong New Area are facing a similar issue.
Our goal was to increase the stock to ensure that the pandas have enough food to eat during the lockdown.
Yu Jinhua, head of Shanghai Wild Animal Park’s giant panda enclosure
How to keep a sustainable supply of fresh bamboo－about 30 kilograms per day－to satisfy the demand of the five giant pandas living there has become a major job for the park administrators.
Before the recent outbreak, the park bought bamboo shoots from the breeding and research base for pandas in Sichuan province, every week. This was no longer possible from April after the lockdown as air freight was affected, according to Yu Jinhua, head of the park's giant panda enclosure.
"We weren't sure how many days the lockdown would last, so we quickly adjusted our bamboo supply plan. Our goal was to increase the stock to ensure that the pandas have enough food to eat during the lockdown," he says, adding that during the outbreak the park procured 500 kg of bamboo each time.
"That would last our pandas about two weeks. This time around, we coordinated with transportation authorities and increased the amount of bamboo shoots we get each time while reducing the frequency of buying them," he says.
Caretakers at Shanghai Wild Animal Park in Pudong district have lived in the park since close-loop management was imposed there in mid-March and taken measures to ensure that the pandas are not infected by the virus. (PHOTO PROVIDED TO CHINA DAILY)
The park has also been placing the bamboo shoots in cold storage to extend their shelf life, adds Yu.
While feeding the pandas was affected in the early days of the lockdown, the park is now able to feed them regularly, Yu says, although the park's breeding project with the panda base in Sichuan has been suspended due to the outbreak.
Caring for the pandas at the Shanghai park has not been affected by the lockdown. Yu says the four caretakers of the pandas have been living in the park since close-loop management was imposed there in mid-March. The caretakers have also taken measures to ensure that the pandas are not infected by the virus. For example, all food provided to the pandas, including bamboo shoots, apples and oranges, is carefully examined and cleaned before feeding. The panda enclosure is also cleaned and disinfected at least twice every week.
"We also record what the pandas eat every day, and weigh them every 10 days," Yu says. "Moreover, the keepers have been told to talk to the pandas and pretend to be tourists so that there is a semblance of normalcy despite these quiet times when there are no visitors to the park."
Caretakers at Shanghai Wild Animal Park in Pudong district have lived in the park since close-loop management was imposed there in mid-March and taken measures to ensure that the pandas are not infected by the virus. (PHOTO PROVIDED TO CHINA DAILY)
Since last month the park has been showing the panda enclosure over livestreaming on Douyin at 9 am every day.
"The online sessions introduce more animal-related knowledge to people and enhance their awareness of wildlife protection while helping them kill time during the lockdown," Yu says.
According to the park, more than 10 million people viewed its panda livestream in the past 30 days and its Douyin account had more than 2.84 million followers, as of May 13.
Similar efforts to care for the animals have been taken at Shanghai Zoo in the city's Changning district, where more than 5,000 animals, including birds, live.
According to The Bund, a Shanghai-based news portal, the zookeepers have taken special measures, such as creating nesting trunks and adding nutrients to daily meals, to help their birds breed as normally as possible during the ongoing breeding season.
Employees at the city's Haichang Ocean Park also celebrated World Penguin Day on April 25 even though it was shut.
It has sent toys and books related to marine animals to young COVID-19 patients in makeshift hospitals.
