CHENGDU - A dead giant panda has been spotted by staffers at the forestry bureau of Baoxing County, known as the "hometown of giant pandas", in Southwest China's Sichuan province.

The carcass, found in a watercourse on Thursday, has been salvaged and transported to the rescue center at the Bifengxia panda base in Ya'an, which falls under the China Conservation and Research Center for the Giant Panda.

The cause of death of the giant panda will be determined by experts.

Giant pandas were first discovered in Baoxing County about a century ago. Currently, more than 80 percent of the county area forms part of the Giant Panda National Park, which was established in 2021 and spans 27,000 square km across three provinces -- Sichuan, Shaanxi and Gansu.

Thanks to protection efforts by Chinese zoologists, the International Union for Conservation of Nature downgraded the status of the giant panda from endangered to vulnerable in 2016. Nearly 1,900 giant pandas are living in the wild in China.