Special report: Reconstruction After Earthquake

    BEIJING, June 12 (Xinhua) -- China's major giant panda habitat, home to about 1,400 of the wild bears, suffered great damage in the recent earthquake, said a State Forestry Administration (SFA) senior official.

    The 8.0-magnitude earthquake that hit the southwestern Sichuan Province on May 12 damaged the major habitat of many wild animals, including the giant pandas. It affected 28.5 million mu (about 1.9 million hectares), or 83 percent of the total area of the panda habitat in the country, said Yin Hong, SFA deputy director.

    About 8.3 percent of the panda habitat was completely destroyed. One panda died in the quake in Wolong nature reserve, and another was still missing, said Yin.

    "The dense forests covering these places are now turned into bare land," said Yan Xun, chief engineer of the SFA department for the protection of wild animals and plants. "As the plantation disappeared, the living environment is completely destroyed."

    "Landslides and forestry destruction pose severe threats to the lives of the surviving pandas," said Yan.

    Caves and tree hollows where pandas live might be damaged by the tremor. The route they used to take to find food might be blocked.

    Water in the habitat is polluted, and some of the bamboo is buried or smashed. Some habitats are simply wiped out. Large landslides might also block the connections between individual pandas, and hamper their spontaneous movement to safer places, said Yan.

    After a major earthquake in Sichuan in 1976, bamboos flowered and died in large patches, causing a food shortage for pandas. The authorities were monitoring the condition of the habitat, especially bamboo plants, said Yan.

    "We have transferred 14 giant pandas to safe places outside the nature reserve, including the eight to be exhibited during the Olympics (in Beijing), and the two to be sent to Taiwan," Yin said.

    It is still too dangerous for our staff to go into the field. When conditions allow, we would search the area and see if there are injured pandas that need help," Yan said.