Giant pandas aren’t having enough sex to grow their populations, and their gut microbes might be to blame.
Habitat destruction and climate change already make it hard for giant pandas to survive. They also face an additional challenge: they struggle to reproduce, especially in captivity. Pandas are solitary creatures, and females have just one fertile window of about 40 hours each year. Meanwhile, males aren’t very promiscuous, and they don’t know how to mount females properly.
żěè¶ĚĘÓƵs have long been trying to understand why captive pandas are so bad at sex: studies show the psychological stress of probably plays a part, as does the lack of mating competition.
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But researchers at Beijing Normal University had a hunch that diet might be responsible too – specifically, its effect on the gut microbiome. When they analysed 72 faecal samples from 20 different male giant pandas – some good at sex, others not so much – they discovered one stark difference: the sexually competent group had a significantly higher abundance of a microbe called Clostridium.
Since gut microbes influence everything from immunity to behaviour, this lack of Clostridium could be inhibiting panda libido.
“We’ve found the relationship, but we’re not sure yet whether this is the only real reason for their poor sexual performance,” says study author at Beijing Normal University. The bigger picture is probably more complex, says Liu, with different plausible factors weighing in.
“This has very important implications for conservation,” says at San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance in California, who was not involved in the study.
For one, this new data could help conservationists tweak how pandas are fed in captivity. Previous research has shown that, to help boost Clostridium in the gut, pandas can eat as well as more flavonoid compounds.
To achieve this, Liu suggests rotating the types of bamboo that pandas are fed in captivity to mimic the seasonal changes they would experience in the wild.
Ecology and Evolution
