Spring has brought with it a plentiful fruiting season to Lamandau Wildlife Reserve, meaning orangutans don’t need to be visiting our camp feeding sites to compensate for food shortages anymore. Because of this, our field staff aren’t seeing nearly as many orangutans as they did earlier in the year!
That is why we were especially excited to catch a glimpse of one of our rescued orangutans, Okto, playing in the trees this week. As a young juvenile, Okto has been part of our soft-release programme for the past 6 months. This programme is for young orangutans that need extra monitoring and care. They are taken daily to the forest to learn about their natural food resources and to practice their climbing.
Now that the fruiting season has begun, Okto has been seen to be enjoying climbing as well as finding all the right fruits to feed himself with. This comes as wonderful news to the Foundation, as it is proof that our soft-release programme is good preparation for an orangutan to survive in the wild.
[Okto eating ubar fruits]
[Okto not eating ubar fruits…]
