Panda pregnancies: What you didn’t know you didn’t know

CGTN Europe

How long is a panda pregnancy? Whatever number you just said, you might be right or you might be wrong.  Speaking from Berlin Zoo, where panda Meng Meng is expecting twins, CGTN’s Peter Oliver unravels the mysteries of panda pregnancies.   #panda

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00:00There's plenty that's amazing about pandas. Almost everybody knows they're bamboo-only diets and

00:05they're not exactly forthcoming when it comes to having sex. In fact, most pandas born in captivity

00:11are the result of artificial insemination. What you may not know is that it's almost impossible

00:16to predict the length of a panda pregnancy. Most times it takes around four and a half months for

00:22a panda to go full term. However, because of something called embryonic diapause, a phenomenon

00:28whereby a fertilized egg can sit dormant essentially before developing for up to months,

00:35we can never really tell how long it's going to be. Now experts are still unsure exactly why this

00:41is but some say it's so that the mother panda can make sure that she's in a safe environment

00:47before giving birth to her cubs.

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