Lin Lin

Lin Lin is a female giant panda born on 2020-07-26 at Foping National Nature Reserve. Registered under studbook number 1316, she is one of the few giant pandas born and raised in the wild in the Qinling Mountains region of Shaanxi Province, China. Her birth was recorded by reserve monitoring teams as part of long-term population surveys of wild giant pandas. She is the offspring of an unstudbooked wild male giant panda and Cao Cao, a wild female giant panda with studbook number 887. Her maternal lineage traces back to the genetically distinct Qinling giant panda subspecies, which is recognized as a separate evolutionary population from Sichuan giant pandas. Currently living at Foping National Nature Reserve, she participates in the reserve’s long-term wild population monitoring program. Foping National Nature Reserve is a core protected area for wild giant pandas in the Qinling Mountains, managed by the Shaanxi Provincial Forestry and Grassland Administration. As a wild-born Qinling giant panda, Lin Lin displays typical wild foraging and ranging behaviors, relying on native Bashania fangiana bamboo as her primary food source. Her presence confirms the continued success of wild breeding in protected Qinling habitats, supporting research on giant panda subspecies genetics and long-term population viability for this vulnerable species.