Zoo Bares Panda's Dirty Little Secret

The giant panda Bao Bao celebrated her first birthday on Aug. 23. (Photo: Smithsonian National Zoo Facebook page)

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Experts think a coy giant panda at a research and breeding center in China has pulled off the oldest trick in the book: She faked a pregnancy to trade up her surroundings.

Days after the National Zoo celebrated the birth a year ago of its own panda, researchers in China hastily called off a planned broadcast of a live birth at the Chengdu Giant Panda Breeding Research Centre in Sichuan after keepers discovered 6-year-old Ai Hin was faking her pregnancy, The Independent reports.

Last year, video released after the birth of Bao Bao, the now 1-year-old daughter of Mei Xiang and Tian Tian at the Smithsonian National Zoo, made a big media splash. And Bao Bao is still a media darling, as are her parents, who will remain at the zoo through at least 2015 under a research and breeding agreement with the China Wildlife Conservation Association.

Ai Hin had shown classic signs of being pregnant: her appetite was reduced and she was less active. Two months of around-the-clock monitoring later, researchers determined she was just was a very cute liar.

“Phantom pregnancies” aren’t unusual, but Ai Hin’s keepers think hers was deliberate, with the full expectation her clever manipulation would result in certain perks, like more food and cushier surroundings.

Wu Kongju, an expert at the breeding center where Ai Hin is kept, told the state news agency Xinhua that pregnant pandas are moved to single, air-conditioned rooms where they receive constant care.

“They also receive more buns, fruits and bamboo, so some clever pandas have used this to their advantage to improve their quality of life,” Wu said.

Such glimpses into giant panda behavior capture the imagination of a public fascinated with the rare, highly endangered giant pandas. Fewer than 2,000 exist in the world today, 300 of them in captivity, mostly in China.

Their highly endangered status reduces the amount of time to study the so-called “bamboo bear,” their population slipping away due to bamboo die-offs and the lack of genetic diversity among wild giant pandas, according to the Giant Panda Conservation Fund at the National Zoo.

Among the conservation successes is the captive breeding agreement between China and the United States. Mei Xiang and Tian Tian are the National Zoo’s second pair of giant pandas. The first two, Ling-Ling and Hsing-Hsing were given to the United States by the government of China after President Richard Nixon’s historic visit in 1972.

» Watch: real-time footage of Mei Xiang, Tian Tian and Bao Bao on National Zoo PandaCam.