Before they can be released to the wild, orangutans have to learn how to survive in the forest – a process that takes months, and can even take years!
Before they are released into the Jantho forest, orangutans are given time to settle in pre-release holding cages deep in the forest. Here they can recuperate from their long journey and begin the learning process of how to survive in the forest.
This can be a slow process taking several months, and even years in some cases. Many have to learn almost everything again, especially those captured from the wild as very young infants. Some, however, have thankfully not spent so long in captivity, and retain many of the forest survival skills that they learned from their mothers.
One of the most important things for the orangutans to learn is which plants are edible, what constitutes food and where and when they can find it. Even then, with foods like the very thorny rotan palm, or termite nests, finding the food is not enough in itself; they still have to learn how to process and eat it. Another essential survival skill is how to build a suitable sleeping nest in the trees. Wild orangutans are adept at making comfortable springy platforms in the canopy to sleep on, by bending and weaving leafy branches together. Some are also skilled at building a roof to provide protection from a heavy downpour. Sleeping high in the canopy is also the best way to avoid ground dwelling predators and soil living parasites.
Usually, an infant learns forest survival skills from its mother during the first several years of its life. At the Jantho Release Site however, the orangutans must be reminded of these skills, taught from scratch by SOCP field staff, or figure things out for themselves by experimenting and learning from other orangutans.
To help them, SOCP staff will look for particular foods and eat (or pretend to eat) them just as the orangutan’s mother would have done, showing them how it is done. Young and friendly orangutans can also be taken out of the cages during the day to attend ‘forest school’. Here they have the opportunity to explore and learn in the forest with other young orangutans, whilst being monitored at a distance by the. In the case of bigger or more dangerous orangutans, they must spend longer in the cages, and as many forest foods as possible will be brought to them instead. This will still enable them to understand and taste what foods they can eat and how to process them.
Leif Cocks, TOP President.
