Orangutan is directly translated to “person of the forest” in the Maylasian language. This is an appropriate name as they are close cousins to the human. The orangutan is found only on the islands of Sumatra and Borneo in Southeast Asia. You can spot them from their red-orange hair, brown skin, cheek flaps, and interesting body proportions. The orangutan has the largest arms, proportionally, of the great apes. Their arms almost touch the ground when they walk. Their hooked hands make it easy for them to climb, and their feet, which are similar to their hands, also help. The orangutan is aided in survival by their great cognitive and creative skill. They have shown signs of deception, self-recognition, and foresight.
Diet
Orangutans mostly eat ripe fruit, including figs, but they eat more than 400 kinds of food. This includes insects, honey, and occasionally meat. Orangutans spend around half of their days foraging for food, done mostly by climbing from branch to branch. Orangutans are slower on the ground, and don’t often look for food out of the trees. The orangutans digest water from the fruit they eat, but they also get water from licking wet plants and even their wet fur. The orangutan, especially young ones, must avoid large pythons, crocodiles, and big cats.
Reproduction
Unlike other apes, orangutans are solitary animals. The only time you’ll see an adult male with large cheek pads with someone else is when they are mating or fighting another male. Males make a “long call” sound to alert other males to stay out their way, but the sound also attracts receptive females. The male will wait for the female (who starts reproducing at around 15) to start ovulating before he impregnates her. Some males with small cheek pouches will forcibly mate, even if the female isn’t ovulating. Reproduction is important with orangutans because they only reproduce every seven or eight years. Once mated, the female will have a gestation period for around eight months before giving birth. The babies come out weighing less than 1.5 kg (3.3 pounds). The baby starts fully dependent, then at around seven years old will leave the nest. Some teenage female orangutans will stay with their mothers to learn child rearing. The babies will live from 30 to 40 years in the wild.
Behavior
Orangutans are arboreal. They spend about 90% of their time in tree tops. They rest, eat, and sleep in trees. Because they have large bodies, they build nests to sleep in. The nests are made out of leaves, twigs, and branches. They have been seen making pillows and blankets to go with their nests, which they build every night. When it rains, orangutans use branches to make a quick umbrella and they may make a roof for their nests. Orangutans in general are pretty handy, using twigs as back scratchers and honey extractors. An orangutan culture is staying solitary. Females can tolerate each other, and mothers and children are close, but cheek pouched males stay away from each other. Orangutans also have large home ranges. You will only find 2 or 3 orangutans per square kilometer. Different Orangutan species have unique cultures as well. For example, one species takes some leaves, makes a kissing sound, and then drops the leaves to express excitement. Kissing sounds in all species represent fear or excitement, but many species don’t use the leaves.
Unfortunately, orangutans are critically endangered. There are only about 30,000 orangutans left. The country they live in faces high amounts of deforestation. This means that their habitats are being destroyed. While orangutans are resourceful, they’ll need our help to save them.
