Qizai is a giant panda with a coat of soft brown and white instead of the usual black and white, and for years he has been the only brown panda known to live in human care. He was found alone and weak as a cub of about two months in the Qinling Mountains of Shaanxi province, central China, and has since grown into a healthy, famously relaxed adult at the Foping panda centre.
His name is usually translated as “seventh son”. Sources disagree slightly on the year he was rescued, giving either 2007 or 2009, but they agree on the story: his mother, reportedly black and white, was gone, and the cub was taken in and raised by staff at a provincial wildlife rescue centre. Reports from his early years say other pandas sometimes pushed him around and took his food. He later moved to the Foping centre, where a dedicated keeper looks after him.
For a long time no one knew why he was brown. In March 2024, Chinese scientists published the answer: a small deletion in a single gene. The photos below follow Qizai through the seasons, with the background on his rare colouring, his daily life and what researchers have learned from him.
A rescued cub with an unusual coat
Qizai stretches across a log, showing off the pale caramel patches where most pandas are jet black. The brown covers the same areas as on any giant panda: ears, eye patches, legs and a band across the shoulders. Only the shade is different.
Walking through the grass, his body shape is a perfectly ordinary giant panda’s; just the colour sets him apart. Being different came at a cost when he was young: reports from the reserve described other pandas bullying him and taking his bamboo, which is one reason keepers paid him close attention.
A close-up shows the gentle face that made him a favourite with visitors and photographers. His eye patches are a warm brown, and his nose is dark, as in other pandas. Pictures like this one, published around 2016, carried his story to readers around the world.
Brown pandas of the Qinling Mountains
Qizai sits in a wooded enclosure as light snow falls. Every confirmed brown panda has come from the Qinling Mountains, home to a distinct population of giant pandas recognised as a subspecies, Ailuropoda melanoleuca qinlingensis, in 2005. Qinling pandas are isolated from the larger Sichuan populations, and an estimated 200 to 300 now live in the wild.
Here he pads across a snowy slope, a reminder that pandas stay active through winter rather than hibernating. Brown pandas are extremely rare: since the first known record, a female named Dan Dan found in 1985, only eleven sightings have been reported, and seven have been confirmed by photos or specimens.
Qizai rests among bamboo, the food that makes up almost the whole of a panda’s diet. His black-and-white mother is part of why his colour puzzled scientists for so long: the trait had to be hidden in both parents, which suggested a recessive gene.
The gene behind the brown fur
Seen from behind, the contrast between his creamy white back and brown shoulders is clear. In a study published in PNAS in March 2024, a team at the Chinese Academy of Sciences led by Dengfeng Guan traced the colour to a 25-base-pair deletion in a gene called Bace2, which affects the pigment cells in hair. They worked it out by sequencing the genomes of Qizai and members of his family, then confirmed the result against 192 black-and-white pandas.
Lounging in the grass with a bamboo stalk, Qizai shows that the mutation does not seem to harm him. To test the gene, the researchers used CRISPR gene editing to switch it off in mice; the edited mice developed lighter coats and were otherwise healthy. Earlier ideas that pollution, diet or illness caused the brown coat can now be set aside.
Daily life at the Foping centre
A keeper walks the path through the enclosure, with a panda following behind. Reports from 2016 said Qizai had a personal keeper who organised his day around feeding times, starting around 6 a.m. and staying late into the night. Pandas eat many times a day, so care work follows their meals.
Rolling on his back with a stalk of bamboo, Qizai looks every bit the relaxed celebrity. By 2016 he reportedly weighed more than 100 kg (220 lb) and ate around 20 kg (44 lb) of bamboo a day. Giant pandas need such large amounts because bamboo is low in nutrition and they digest it poorly.
He leans against a wooden platform built to give him something to climb and rest on. His keeper told the press that he was slower than the other pandas, but also cuter. Keepers had hoped to find him a mate, partly to learn whether the trait would pass on; no cubs from him have been reported.
Where Qizai lives
The map marks Foping Panda Valley in southern Shaanxi province, south-west of the city of Xi’an. The area lies within the Foping National Nature Reserve, created in 1978 to protect Qinling pandas and their forest habitat. Visitors to the valley can see pandas in large, semi-natural enclosures, though it is wise to check opening times before travelling.
Why Qizai matters
Qizai’s life is a small conservation success. A cub that might not have survived alone in the forest grew into a healthy adult, and the care he received gave scientists the chance to solve a mystery that had lasted almost forty years. His family DNA helped identify the gene, and the work adds to what is known about coat colour in mammals in general.
He is also an ambassador for the Qinling pandas as a whole. Giant pandas were moved from “endangered” to “vulnerable” on the IUCN Red List in 2016, thanks largely to protected reserves and bamboo forest restoration in China. The small, isolated Qinling population still depends on that protection, and the brown pandas it occasionally produces are a reminder of how much genetic variety a single mountain range can hold.
Sources: Sci.News, “Scientists solve mystery of brown giant pandas” (March 2024, on Guan et al., PNAS); Qinling panda (Wikipedia); Mental Floss, “What gives Qizai his unique colour?”; Sichuan Travel Guide, Rare brown giant panda Qi Zai; Foping Nature Reserve (Travel China Guide). Story first shared by Bored Panda, based on reporting by MailOnline.
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