The Chengdu Zoo - A Family Place

The Chengdu Zoo is in the northern suburbs of the city, surrounded by gardens. It covers 18 hectares, with 250 or more varieties of animals living in the halls, houses, ponds and fenced-up mounds, which are scattered among green trees and colorful flowers.

One unique and most popular feature of the zoo is the panda houses, spacious and ingeniously designed, shaded among bamboo and surrounded by ditches. They are really good homes for the giant and lesser pandas. The Chengdu Zoo is the world's most successful breeder of pandas by artificial insemination. In recent years, tourists from different continents have arrived in a continuous flow to see pandas in their hometown and pandas of the Chengdu Zoo have traveled abroad to charm poeple of different countries. From TibetTours.net.

During the spring, the fruit blossoms make the Zoo an extra special place to spend an afternoon.

The Red Panda, or Lesser Panda, is not as well known as the Giant Panda. Red Pandas are 20-24 inches long with 12-20 inch tails and weight 6.5-11 pounds. They are reddish with well furred and banded tails, large round ears with white fringe and two black stripes from the eyes down the cheeks.

A "Mushroom Garden" in the Zoo

The Monkey Mountain reminded me of the Monkey Island in a public park in Davenport, Iowa, where my father particularly enjoyed watching these wonderfully playful animals.