The only reason pandas can subsist on bamboo is because they're so incredibly lazy

Giant pandas
(Image credit: SAM YEH/AFP/Getty Images)

Scientists have already told us giant pandas spend so much of their day hanging out eating bamboo, a food they can barely digest. Now, a new study published in Science on Friday sheds more light on how exactly they manage to survive on that diet.

Turns out, there's an easy answer: Giant pandas hardly move. The sample size is small, but the wild pandas researchers studied spent about one-half of the time physically active, compared to just one-third for their captive counterparts.

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Julie Kliegman

Julie Kliegman is a freelance writer based in New York. Her work has appeared in BuzzFeed, Vox, Mental Floss, Paste, the Tampa Bay Times and PolitiFact. Her cats can do somersaults.