Relation of bite size in feces with age and population number of Giant Panda (Ailuropoda melanoleuca)
大熊猫粪便中竹子咬节长短与年龄和种群数量关系

There have been three investigations about the population number of giant pandas in the wild in China.They estimated the population number of giant pandas mainl y by the bite size data in the feces of pandas.In 1999 and 2001,the authors studied the relationship between the bite size in f eces and the age at the China Research and Conservation Center for the Giant Pan da.More than 20 000 data was obtained,which was used to complete the statistical analysis and correlation analysis between the bite size and age.We get this res ult:The bite size data is only an individual character.There is no correlation b etween the bite size and the age,and we cannot find the relationship between bit e size,sex,mountains,wild environment and captive environment.We do not know if this character is controlled by heredity.On the other hand,the bite size in the feces is a variable,which is easily affected by the environment(date).According to the statistical analysis,the bite size data is quite different in different i ndividuals and different dates.It changes with the interaction between individua l and data.The bite size data of each panda changes with the date.It is impossib le to use the bite size to estimate the age and the population number in wild in vestigations. Under the management condition,there is no linear correlation and non-linear co rrelation between the age and feces diameter among the giant pandas over two yea rs old.Feces diameter from the pandas under one and a half years is quite differ ent from the giant pandas over two years old.There is no difference in feces dia meter among the giant pandas over two years old.According to the statistical ana lysis of a giant panda's feces diameter,the giant panda's feces diameter is affe cted by the environment(date).The authors also dealt with the experiment date according to reference 2 and 3,a nd the results disagree with references 2 and 3 and the date variation in refere nces 2 and 3 is too small.We can only get a small variation in the data and the strict control disagrees with the mathematical statistics sampling principle.