Orangutan Rescue: On the frontline in Sumatra

An adult male orangutan was rescued yesterday from a rubber plantation in Karang Jadi village, Batang Serangan sub district, Langkat, North Sumatra.

The evacuation was carried out by the Orangutan Information Centre's HOCRU team (Human Orangutan Conflict Response Unit) along with support from the Indonesian government's BKSDA team.

The orangutan was a large cheekpadder,  estimated to be 30 years old. Local people reported that the adult male orangutan and a few other orangutans had been in their village for a long time, cut off from the forest by an oil palm plantation.  Villagers from Karya Jadi told the rescue team that the orangutan had damaged their crops and had even chased local farmers in their rubber plantations. The farmers had threatened to kill the orangutan unless he was relocated, as their feared for their lives and their livelihoods. 

The orangutan was safely tranquilised and brought down from a rubber tree, then given a thorough health check by the OIC's vet, Dr. Ricko. The government authority approved the immediate release of the orangutan back into the forest, so he was transported to the forest restoration site within the Gunung Leuser National Park, part of the Leuser Ecosystem, and released the same day. 

All evacuations of this nature are inherently high-risk for the orangutans and the rescue team, and are only carried out as a last resort if the orangutan's life is in greater danger if not relocated. SOS and OIC work hard to protect Sumatran orangutans and secure a future for them in the wild through conservation programmes and campaigns that keep their forest home safe.

Thank you so much for supporting this vital work, your donations to the rescue team mean that they can help more orangutans in danger and give them a second chance at life in the wild.