Wonderful news from Lamandau Wildlife Reserve! BKSDA (government agency) has announced that Labetty has given birth. On June 11th, in the early morning, Labetty was spotted near Camp Rasak holding her newborn infant. She then returned to the forest and they lost sight of her.

A week after the first sighting, BKSDA returned to camp and followed Labetty from a distance to make sure they were both in a healthy condition. She was with her infant carrying out normal behaviour. New mothers spend their days resting, eating and breastfeeding. Newborns rely heavily on their mother for survival, never separating from their body.

Mothers will be very protective of their young, making sure to avoid other orangutans, especially other mother-infant pairs. It is expected that Labetty’s infant is a male.

Labetty’s mother, Lady di, is an ex-captive orangutan who was released into Lamandau Wildlife Reserve in 2006 and later gave birth to Labetty in 2007. It is encouraging that third generation offsprings are being born, increasing the orangutan population and demonstrating that the Reserve is an optimum habitat.

Also, in Camp Rasak, ten-year-old Boy, who has been part of the soft-release programme since his rescue in 2017 at only three-years-old, has been improving his essential forest skills needed to live independently in the wild.

Boy is a very curious individual and enjoys exploring the forest. There, he regularly meets wild Ariel, the son of Acuy, or Bumi and they will play together all day, climbing very high in the treetops.

At the beginning of April, Boy got a serious wound on his finger and other parts of his body. The incident occurred when Boy was taken to the forest as usual. He did not want to return to camp in the evening as he preferred to play with Bumi. Both moved deeper into the forest and because of the heavy rain, the staff were unable to continue monitoring him. As Boy is now an older juvenile, with great independence, it was possible that he had an encounter with a dominant male in the wild, where he likely fought and lost.

The next day, Boy returned to camp with wounds and camp staff immediately put him in a cage for treatment. The vets examined him and provided medical treatment. As his index finger was injured, Boy’s forest training has had to be put on pause as his finger heals.

Hopefully he will soon be ready to receive a pre-release medical examination and finally be released into the wild.