It's shocking to think that there are only about 1,600 giant pandas remaining in the wild.

Today they can only be found in the forest areas high in the mountains of south-western China. But the terrible catastrophe of last year's earthquake, which tragically devastated countless human lives, has also worsened the plight of the panda.

Massive landslides, triggered by the earthquake, destroyed great swathes of forest - which had already been fragmented by agriculture, industry, roads and other forms of encroachment. That means that the pandas have even more trouble finding enough of their staple diet - bamboo

St Mirren in the Community are contributing to the World Wildlife Fund's 'Adopt a Panda' scheme which endeavours to :

•help restore damaged nature reserves and field stations
•restore panda monitoring and patrolling routes
•help local communities to recover from the earthquake
•promote green reconstruction in local communities
Stay tuned to www.saintmirren-community.com for Giant Panda updates and information on decreasing your environmental impact.

If you are running a school project on Giant Pandas, drop us a line and we can forward on some WWF information.