HONG KONG, April 24 (Xinhua) -- The new giant pandas coming to town are believed to be able to fit the new environment within a month, Director of Wolong Nature Reserve Administration Zhang Hemin Tuesday tried to resolve the concern of panda fans in Hong Kong at a talk on conservation of giant pandas.

    The Central Government of China announced earlier to give a pair of young and healthy giant pandas to Hong Kong as a gift in celebration of the 10th anniversary of its return to the motherland.

    The young couple, chosen from the China Conservation and Research Center for the Giant Panda in Wolong in southwest Sichuan Province, were both born in August 2005. They are expected to arrive in Hong Kong on Thursday.

    About 300 local students and members of the pubic Tuesday joined the talk hosted by Zhang, a panda expert from Wolong. The audience raised questions about how they can help protect the pandas and how long the new pairs will take to adapt to the new home.

    "Giant pandas have strong adaptability," said Zhang, citing An An and Jia Jia for example, who came to Hong Kong in 1999 as a gift from the central government and are now living in Hong Kong Ocean Park.

    "They accommodated well after they came here and now they are still very healthy," Zhang said.

    Since the new pandas are at a younger age, Zhang said, it should be easier for them to get along with the new environment and probably they could do it in one month's time.

    Some attendees came to queue up outside the lecture hall of the science museum more than an hour before the talk start to secure a place for the event.

    Occupying a second place of the line, Mr. Lui, a 48-year-old laboratory technician, specially took a leave from work to attend the talk. Attracted by the lovable appearance of giant pandas, Mr. Lui started to read books about pandas and he hoped to get a deeper understanding of the animal by listening to experts.

    Showing up early was also Ms Lee who was in a T-shirt printed with images of giant pandas. She told the reporter that she have been to Ocean Park for many times to see An An and Jia Jia and she looked forward to seeing the new pandas to come to Hong Kong.

    Upon arrival of the new giant pandas, the Hong Kong government will hold a handover ceremony at the passenger terminal of the Hong Kong International Airport and announce the results of "Name the Giant Pandas" activity, which was held in the city previously.

    As a member of the adjudication panel, Zhang will help select a pair of names for the giant pandas amongst 13,000 entries received in the activity.

    "Easy to read, beautiful and meaningful will be main criteria of selecting names for the new pandas," said Zhang who will join the mainland delegation led by the State Forestry Administration to witness the giant panda handover ceremony.