In nature, lions and tigers are the undisputed kings, and are the objects that other animals dare not provoke. But we have never heard of giant pandas encountering them in the wild, let alone being eaten by them. Why is this?

The ancient Chinese directly regarded the panda as the mythical beast Pixiu in "The Records of Mount Emei". Dongfang Shuo of the Han Dynasty described the giant panda in this way in "Shu Yi Zhi". He said, "There are beasts in the south, named "It is said to eat iron", so people also call pandas "iron-eating beasts". In folklore, people have trained pandas to fight in ancient times. It is said that when Chiyou fought with the Yellow Emperor, his mount was a panda. It can be seen that under the innocent appearance of the giant panda, it is a beast no less than a lion or a tiger.

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In this case, if giant pandas and lions and tigers are put together, who is more powerful?

In fact, the giant panda is actually a kind of bear. In taxonomy, giant pandas belong to the order Carnivora and the family Ursidae, which means that giant pandas are out-and-out bears. Many people know that giant pandas like to eat bamboo. In fact, although there are more than 200 species of bamboo in my country, there are only a few dozen species that pandas like to eat. Moreover, bamboo can provide very little nutrition. In the season when bamboo is scarce and food is scarce, giant pandas will also prey on wild deer, goats and other small animals, and sometimes even attack livestock fed by villagers. In places such as Sichuan where there are relatively large numbers of giant pandas, there are frequent reports of giant pandas attacking livestock.

The ferocity of lions and tigers is well-known to every household, but in ordinary people's understanding, giant pandas seem to have nothing to do with these two animals, and are completely harmless to humans and animals. In fact, in the wild, wild giant pandas are no less ferocious than lions and tigers. What is going on?

Where pandas live, the most common carnivores are wolves and leopards. These animals simply do not dare to provoke giant pandas. If we had known, although giant pandas have been eating bamboo for millions of years and their teeth have degenerated, their teeth still retain the characteristics of carnivores, with unusually developed canines and molars. Thanks to their good teeth, giant pandas can use hard bamboo as their staple food.

And the bite force of the giant panda is also very good. Some scholars once made statistics on the bite force of carnivores in nature and found that the bite force of the giant panda is second only to polar bears, tigers, brown bears, and lions. Fifth, it ranks among the best among bears. Data shows that the bite force of an adult giant panda is about 1,300 cows. Such a large bite force is not much worse than that of lions and tigers.

As a "bear", the giant panda, like its other bear relatives, has a pair of powerful bear paws. Its bear paws are very thick and have six claws on them. This not only gives the panda the ability to climb trees, but also helps the giant panda quickly climb up the tree to avoid threats or hunting. It can explode with one palm of its full strength. With the strength of 1,600 cows, this much force is enough to kill many animals directly.

Usually in the zoo, giant pandas behave very lazy, always wandering around slowly and leisurely. This is mainly because under the conditions of artificial feeding, giant pandas always live a life without worries about food and clothing. However, in the harsh living environment of the wild, giant pandas are actually very agile. Wild giant pandas can run at a speed of up to 40km/h. Jamaican star Bolt is the fastest man in the world. He set a 100-meter time of 9.58 seconds. The world record, converted to almost 37km/h, means that even the fastest person cannot outrun a wild giant panda. Not only are they fast, but their skin is also very strong. There is a thick layer of fat under their skin, which can reduce damage when they compete with other predators.

So it seems that although our national treasure giant panda has been vegetarian for millions of years, its combat effectiveness is no less than that of top predators. What would happen if giant pandas and lions and tigers were put together in the wild?

The tiger is known as the king of beasts and is the super predator at the top of the food chain. Generally speaking, adult tigers are close to or even more than three meters long and weigh more than 200 kilograms. Despite its huge size, tigers can still chase their prey at speeds of more than 80 kilometers per hour, surpassing pandas in both speed and strength.

Lions mainly live on the African savannah. As top predators, they are comparable to tigers. However, they do not like to be solitary like tigers. Lions are social animals. Generally speaking, a group of lions It consists of one to two male lions and a dozen female lions. Facing such a ferocious beast, the panda has no power to parry.

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So if giant pandas and lions and tigers were really put together, the one most vulnerable to injury would probably be the giant panda.

Although lions and tigers are much more powerful than pandas, these animals live in completely different environments in the wild. It is impossible for a wild giant panda to see a lion or tiger in its lifetime. The biggest threat to wild giant pandas is the smaller jackals. Although one jackal will not pose a threat to the panda, dozens of jackals in groups will threaten the safety of the panda.

Today, under human protection, the number of wild giant pandas is increasing, but the total number is still less than 2,000. If you encounter giant pandas in the wild, don't be fooled by their cute appearance. They are truly "ferocious beasts".