The world’s only all-white giant panda was captured on video at the end of February, and footage was released for the first time Saturday by the Wolong National Nature Reserve in Sichuan Province, China.
The all-white panda, being referred to as an albino panda, was first spotted and photographed in April 2019 when it was 1 or 2 years old. Now the white panda is nearly the size of an adult, according to China Daily.
There were 15 video recordings “of overlapping trajectories” of three pandas over a short period, the reserve authorities stated.
They said part of the video footage captured by infrared cameras shows the all-white panda approaching a mother panda and her cub resting in a tree hollow, though footage shown by state-run CGTN shows a compilation of the three. Apparently, the white panda signaled a desire to interact, and the mother panda remained calm and didn’t move.
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“The cub in the footage is about 1 to 2 years old, and the all-white panda is nearly the size of an adult,” Wei Rongping, senior engineer at the China Conservation and Research Center for Giant Pandas, told China Daily.
“By the end of February, adult wild pandas in Wolong are in the estrus (mating) season, during which female pandas with cubs can be very aggressive when an adult panda approaches or invades.
“This female panda was extremely calm and did not behave as expected. One possibility is that she is the mother of the all-white panda.”
Officials determined that the giant panda was an albino since it has red eyes and no spots. It’s believed to be the only one of its kind.
Li Sheng, researcher, Peking University, told CGTN: “There is another rare color variation of the giant panda in the northern Qinling Mountains, where the giant panda is distributed. It is a brown-and-white color variation.
“A very rare all-white (albino) giant panda was recorded at Wolong, and this may be due to the genetic mutation.”