August 21, 2006—This spring Xiang Xiang became the first captive-born giant panda to be released into the wild. The 176-pound (80-kilogram) male had been trained for wild living from the age of two at the China Conservation and Research Center for the Giant Panda in Wolong. He is the pioneer in a program to reintroduce pandas to their native habitat and possibly double the wild population.

Go behind the scenes of this unique conservation effort, as a National Geographic film crew follows Xiang Xiang from his home at the Panda Center to his ceremonial release in the bamboo-covered mountains of Sichuan Province (interactive map of China).