Well, for starters, "phantom pregnancies" -- or "pseudo pregnancies" -- are quite common among giant pandas (they occur in other species, too). Pseudo-pregnant pandas exhibits signs of pregnancy, including a decreased appetite and activity level, along with some physical changes.
Half of all panda births result in twins, however, it is very rare for both cubs to survive as giant pandas almost always abandon a cub if they give birth to more than one. The reason is that they don't have sufficient milk or energy to care for two so focus their attentions on the strongest club.
There's intense competition for each female, and the dominant male will mate with her several times to ensure success. And that strategy works: Wild female pandas generally give birth every two years. But that low birth rate means that captive breeding programs are essential to sustaining the endangered species.
Giant Pandas Are Very Bad at Keeping Babies Alive
Their small size and developmental immaturity combine for a panda infant mortality rate during the first year of 40%. In fact, newborn pandas often die within days of being born.
Pandas can poop up to 40 times a day. The rest of the time is spent eating or sleeping. Sometimes they eat and poop at the same time.
The Chinese government owns nearly all the giant pandas on earth. And American zoos will shell out up to $1 million a year to rent just one. Most sign 10-year "panda diplomacy" contracts, and if any baby cubs are born, they pay an additional one-time $400,000 baby tax.
The animals were kept separate and only brought together when it was time to mate, so mating pairs weren't able to exchange scent and vocal cues as they normally would in the wild.
Pandas are notoriously bad at mating, largely because male pandas — like their human counterparts, some might say — are inept at reading females' signals.
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