Courtship of wild giant pandas spotted in SW China

STORY: Courtship of wild giant pandas spotted in SW China DATELINE: March 7, 2023 LENGTH: 0:00:45 LOCATION: CHENGDU, China CATEGORY: ENVIRONMENT/SOCIETY SHOTLIST: 1. various of wild giant pandas 2. SOUNDBITE (Chinese): MA WENHU, Staffer, Tangjiahe area of China's Giant Panda National Park STORYLINE: Two wild giant pandas have been recently spotted in search of mates in a national park in southwest China's Sichuan Province. SOUNDBITE (Chinese): MA WENHU, Staffer, Tangjiahe area of China's Giant Panda National Park "Because the light was particularly good that day, I scanned the slope opposite me with a monocular telescope. As a result, I accidentally came across the pandas on a tree." Park experts said the behavior of giant pandas smearing odor with their perianal glands, coupled with the fact that the first panda to climb the tree was a female, indicates the arrival of giant panda estrus in spring. The fourth national survey of giant pandas in 2015 found that there were 1,864 wild giant pandas in China.

Japanese grass snake 'borrows' poison from toxic toads: study

Japanese grass snake 'borrows' poison from toxic toads: study

TOKYO, Japan - The Japanese grass snake does not produce the toxic fluid it shoots out from glands near the neck, but it stores the poison found in its prey, such as toxic toads, according to a team of researchers from Kyoto University and Old Dominion University in Virginia. Photos provided by Akira Mori, an assistant professor at Kyoto University, show a grass snake (top) and a toxic toad (bottom). (Kyodo)

World's 1st calf born from cow cloned by milk-secreting fluid

World's 1st calf born from cow cloned by milk-secreting fluid

SAPPORO, Japan - Photo shows a calf born from a cow cloned from cells contained in fluid from its mammary glands. Rakuno Gakuen University, of Ebetsu, Hokkaido, which offered the photo, said it is the world's first offspring of its kind. The calf -- a male weighing 40 kilograms -- was born July 30 at the university but has now been killed so that researchers can conduct anatomical and tissue tests on it.