Red Pandas Rumored to Mimic Human Behavior, Including Language

Until recently, the most famous panda was the white and black one. As for the red panda, these cute guys have lived in the shadow of their cousins. It is time we gave them their due, and the Internet already decreed them as the most popular animal.

But what do we actually know about these tiny carnivores? We know they are adorable – just look at that selfie at #10. What you did not really know is that they are great at mimicking human behavior.

Wait until you learn how they communicate – it is insane!

Adorable Animals

They’re bigger than a raccoon but smaller than a big panda. They’re adorable, and although not really pet material, people from India and Nepal keep them as pet and post videos of their antics for us to see and laugh at.

And what’s funnier is that sometimes, we see in them a lot of our gestures and preferences, such as this one at #11.

Firefoxes

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Did you know that red pandas are called “firefoxes” in Chinese? They call them hunho, which means firefox. Some people call them “first panda” – learn why from #4.

Although not as social as foxes, these adorable bears like to live in solitude – just like some of us do.

They rarely travel in packs, but would do this weird thing pretty often…

Communication of Red Pandas

Do you have a friend who uses too much body language? Head jerking when saying a certain word, a lot of hands waving around as they tell a story? Well, the red pandas surely have copied this from us. They’re said to often communicate with head bobbing or tail arching, but they’d also have a warning whistle and a “huff-quack” noise.
And there’s one more funny thing about their “vocabulary.”

Tweeting = Twittering

Red pandas tweet. Not on Twitter like us, but they kind of use it almost for the same thing – to signal reproductive intent.

They make a noise called “twittering,” which researchers at the National Zoo observed to be more present during mating season. Talking about the mating season, here’s another weird detail about how similar red pandas and humans are.

This is crazy!