Red pandas live at an altitude between 3,000 and 12,000 feet in forests with dense bamboo growth. Females require tree hollows or other naturally occurring shelters for raising young. During daylight hours, they often sleep in trees. During the short growing season, they may also feed on fruit, berries or seeds. They occasionally eat small animals and, rarely, domestic crops.
Pandas are seasonal breeders.
Breeding occurs between December and February. Gestation is 4 to 6 months. China and Nepal have rapidly growing human populations and their need for timber, fuel and grazing land causes widespread loss of forested lands that support bamboo growth. Even in national parks and reserves, livestock grazing and timber extraction are destroying bamboo at an alarming rate. Young pandas are killed by domestic and feral dogs, while poachers hunt them for the fur trade.