Red Panda

Red pandas are distant relatives of giant pandas. They both love to eat bamboo, and they have an extra wrist bone on their front paws that acts like a “thumb” to help them grasp and eat the shoots and leaves.

Red pandas spend their life in trees. Their feet, claws and tail help them climb from branch to branch—and come down head first! Red panda mothers make nests in a hollow tree or rocky gap in which to have their babies—usually two or three at a time. The babies are born in the spring or summer and stay with their mother until the following winter.