Pandas (National Geographic Readers Series) Book

The whole world loves panda bears. Everyone loves to watch them play, climb, cuddle, and chew. But careful, they can scratch too—just look at that tree! Pandas live in wild places very faraway, and they are the STAR ATTRACTIONS of every zoo that keeps them safe and well, all over the world.

Children's Literature

Children, parents, and grandparents will enjoy the colorful photographs of both baby and adult panda bears. Although the text is factual, it is presented in a lively manner. Readers will learn what pandas like to eat for breakfast—bamboo, bamboo, and more bamboo, of course. Readers may not know that pandas have to eat twenty to forty pounds of bamboo each day just to stay alive and that it takes sixteen hours a day to find all that bamboo to eat. Although the most familiar pandas are black and white, the red panda grows only to the size of a cat. A red panda has rings around its long tail and looks more like a raccoon than a panda bear. Some other less known facts are that it takes four years to tell if a panda cub is a boy or girl, they use eleven different calls to communicate with each other, and the cubs are pink when they are born. The color comes from their mother's saliva when she licks them. Pandas can eat more than 22,000 pounds of bamboo each year. People love to watch pandas at the zoo or by video cameras. Schreiber's book will give readers the chance to see these delightful animals in pictures. Illustrations are in color. Reviewer: Della A. Yannuzzi