📸 PhotoPhoto: Daiju Azuma · CC BY-SA 2.5 · Wikimedia Commons Source
Eastern Red Panda
Ailurus styani (Eastern Red Panda · Eastern Red Panda)
Not Evaluated (NE) on the IUCN Red List yet.
💡 Everyday Comparisons for Size, Mass & Speed
- 💡 When looking at red panda photos, a redder face with less white and more distinct tail rings are traits of the eastern red panda (Science Advances 2020 figure caption).
- 💡 Once considered a single species, red pandas were split into two species following the 2020 study, and two scientific names—Ailurus fulgens and Ailurus styani—are now used.
Reference standards: coach bus ~12 m, mid-size car ~4.9 m, compact car ~1 t, basketball hoop 3.05 m, credit card 8.56 cm.
📖 1. Overview
The eastern red panda is a red panda lineage distinguished as a separate species from the western red panda (Ailurus fulgens) in a 2020 genomic study, living in Yunnan and Sichuan, China.
🦴 2. Anatomy & Morphology
Its facial fur is redder with less white than that of the western red panda, and its tail rings are more distinct, showing a strong contrast between dark red and whitish rings. Its skull is also known to have a greater zygomatic width and greatest length.
🔍 3. Ecology & Behavior
By analyzing the genomes of 65 wild red pandas, researchers found that the eastern red panda experienced two population bottlenecks and one major population expansion in the past. Female red pandas tend to disperse farther than males.
🇰🇷 4. Connection to Korea
No direct record connecting this species to Korea has been found.
📚 Sources & References
- • IUCN Red List: not evaluated (NE) — cross-checked with the Wikidata conservation-status entry
- • mammaldiversity.org — 1005803
- • wikidata.org — Q89502501
- • commons.wikimedia.org — File:Ailurus fulgens styani.jpg
- • pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov — PMC7043915
- • Silhouette: PhyloPic — Xavier A. Jenkins · CC0 1.0 (Congeneric silhouette — Ailurus fulgens)
Recorded dimensions are widely cited representative estimates from public literature and may vary by study or specimen.