Enriching the lives of our primates

Volunteer Tine explains the importance of the enrichment programme to the primates – and the people – at our centre in Ciapus.
 

A schedule is prepared to ensure varied enrichment

To ensure high animal welfare standards at our centre we implemented an enrichment calendar in 2011 which makes sure that enrichment items vary and are given on a daily basis.

Enrichment is every addition to the environment of an animal in captivity that offers it the opportunity to behave naturally and therefore improve its welfare. We use enrichment mainly to stimulate natural behaviour, decrease abnormal behaviour, reduce boredom and to encourage activity. However, in order to conduct group-forming processes it can also be beneficial to manipulate social behaviour. One example is to provide enrichment items to keep dominant animals busy so others have time to relax and groom. If you are planning to introduce two animals to each other it can also be useful to see how the individuals react to new stimuli as a way to find out more about the character and behaviour of the animals.

The animals love a challenge

Another really important part of our work is the education of our animal keepers. We trained our local staff to take down behaviour using an ethogram (chart with behaviours represented by a code). This is usually done by university students and trained primatologists. They also learned how to use the collected data to create tables, graphics and presentations. By doing this, we can have a more objective method on collecting data of our animals at the centre. This is important to record an increase or decrease in abnormal behaviour, to observe if the provided enrichment has the desired effect and to measure the progress of an animal in the resocialisation and rehabilitation process.

Worms are hidden inside balls

Observations are particularly important before and after introductions. Like humans, apes and monkeys have different personalities and not everybody likes each other, so the recorded data show us if we have made a good choice for each individual. The more we understand about our animals individually, the more we can do to help provide them with a better life, particularly during captivity.

Seeds are stuck into melons

Whilst most of our local staff was sceptical about the reasons for enrichment and observations in the beginning, it is very nice to see that there has been a positive change in their attitude over time. As most of them didn’t get a chance to finish school, it makes them very happy to be able to learn how to use programmes like Microsoft Excel, Word and Powerpoint. At IAR, we believe that educating the local people is just as important as saving the animals!

A group of animal keepers is currently busy developing an enrichment catalogue showing how to create the different items we use. As soon as it is ready, it will be shared with other organisations and sanctuaries to encourage an active exchange of experiences.

Lulu the slow loris makes a speedy getaway!

Most of the slow lorises that we care for arrive at our Primate Rehabilitation Centre in Ciapus, Java but vets were on hand recently to care for and release Lulu the slow loris from our Orangutan Rehabilitation Centre in Ketapang. Vet Silje Robertson tells us more...

Lulu ready for release

Not long ago a man brought a slow loris to our centre. He claimed it had appeared at his house the same day and offered to sell the animal to us. However, after some discussion he surrendered the animal to IAR. We gave her the name Lulu: she is an adult female with all her teeth intact and completely wild.  As she was slightly underweight we decided to delay the release for some days in order to make sure her medical condition was good and stable.

After a few days of recovering at the centre, we released her in the evening in the forest surrounding our new centre in Ketapang. There was nothing slow about her as she jetted out of the transportation cage and hurried up a tree close by! And who knows, maybe we will see her again someday after we make our big move.

As for the new centre, it is coming along in good speed. The foundation for the clinic and the quarantine area has already been started and it is very exciting to see the progress. View the photos on Facebook.

Tulip and Pelangsi arrive, Ceria leaves the quarantine and Sigit and Ujang move to the big baby school

Vet Silje Robertson provides a round up of the latest news from our centre in Ketapang.

Tulip

On Thursday afternoon last week our team set out on another confiscation action; this time in our own town of Ketapang. The owner contacted IAR and the forestry department himself and confessed to keeping a baby orangutan captive. The man claimed to have traded the animal for his gun a month earlier: the men he traded with said they had killed the baby’s mother and were going to kill the baby as well. She was given the name Tulip and was kept on a leash in a cage of about 2m² in their backyard. She was fed only with bananas and sweet biscuits. Tulip is naturally still scared, but is in good health and has a healthy appetite. For now she must settle for playing alone in the baby quarantine area, but as soon as she finishes her quarantine time she can join the others.

The team are working around the clock to save Pelangsi

The next day we received news of an orangutan being trapped in a wild boar snare in a forest area outside Ketapang; apparently for over a week! We rushed to the area and after a half hour trek in the forest we reached the site. We were all relieved to see that the animal, a young male, was still alive, although only barely. His right wrist was caught in the snare: a rope that lies covered under leaves on the ground and tightens and pulls upwards when the wild boar (or in this case the orangutan) steps in the loop. It soon became clear that his right hand could not be saved as what remained of the hand and wrist was only dead, severely infected tissue. We sedated him, freed him from the snare and gave him fluids as he was severely dehydrated before we transported him back to our clinic. He is given the name Pelangsi, after the area in which he was found. His condition is still very critical and he is not yet stable and strong enough to undergo surgery. Our medical team is working around the clock and we hope that Pelangsi will recover as soon as possible.

Ceria

Ceria finished her quarantine period with flying colours last week and is now enjoying the playground in the baby school area. Albeit a bit hesitant in the beginning, now she seems to enjoy the company of her new friends. She has a bit more wild nature than our other babies and is bringing more speed in the game by climbing high and fast!

Sigit and Ujang were moved from the baby school to the back transit area with the older babies. This means going from an environment where you are the biggest and toughest to being the smallest! Sigit is adapting very well, but Ujang is not leaving Sigit’s side (or foot) and needs a bit more time to feel confident in the new area.

Cute baby Marsela joins the family in Ketapang

Volunteers Silje Robertson and Jesus Mayoral introduce Marsela...

The latest arrival at the orangutan rescue centre is Marsela, a cute baby of 3 to 4 years. She is named after the street she was found on, Jalan Marsela. The street runs through a palm oil plantation and it was security staff at this plantation who found Marsela crossing the street alone. As the mother was nowhere in sight they caught her and brought her to us on March 16th after learning about our rescue centre from the Gunung Palung National Park and the local forestry department. She is fairly shy and wild, and very scared of humans. That is normal considering she has come straight from what used to be forest and now sadly has become a palm oil plantation.

She was under a lot of stress and showing aggressive behaviour when she first arrived at IAR but after almost 2 weeks in our care she is seemingly doing better, eating well and is less sceptical. Fortunately, even though she is a little underweight for her age, she looks healthy and hopefully will have a bright future.

William and Wince

Lonely William finds a mate! Volunteer Tine Rattel tells us more...

 

Long-tailed macaques like most primates are very sociable animals and live in large groups in the wild. William is one of our long-tailed macaques, he is heavily-built and is quite dominant. Housed all alone for years without any social contact, he showed a lot of stereotypical behaviour. For that reason, we always try to socialise new animals as soon as possible with other individuals of their species.

In general, it is easier to introduce males and females to each other, particularly if one or both animals have a dominant character. As much as we try to find a suitable partner for everybody, this can sometimes be difficult, particularly if we have a sex-ratio imbalance. Therefore, first of all William was introduced to Cheeta, one of our other long-tailed macaque males. We tried for a few days but they had a lot of fights so we decided to split them up again. It was not easy to find a suitable mate for William but finally Wince, a shy young female, came into the rescue centre. We placed both of them next to each other first for a few days after she came out of quarantine. The keepers saw them several times grooming each other through the wire mesh which was promising, so we let them both in together. There were no fights at all and we saw them immediately mating and grooming. William shows less abnormal behaviour since he is not on his own any more and we hope to see a continuing improvement over time. The next step will be to add two more females, Engkis and Herang to form gradually a social group which we will hopefully be able to release into the wild in the future.

We rescue sad Ceria

Silje Robertson introduces a second new arrival to our centre this week...

On 7 March our team was called out on another rescue operation. Only 20 minutes drive from the centre a young female orangutan was being held captive in the town of Mulia baru, Ketapang.

The owner claimed to have found her hurt on the ground in a palm oil plantation a week earlier, but changed his story a few times during the time we were with him, so as usual there is no way of knowing the truth about the animal’s background.

She was kept in a cage outside their house together with a large number of hens. She had a chain around her neck, confining her movements inside the already small cage. Although the skin in the area where the chain was is not damaged, the lack of hair and the skin colour indicates that she had been wearing the chain longer than the seven days claimed by the owner.

Her name is Ceria which in Indonesian means happy or carefree, and it is a tragic irony. She is clearly depressed, nervous, underweight and suffering from malnourishment.

Fortunately she is eating and drinking well with us and seems to have no other medical problems. Her estimated age is 3-4 years old; she has long healthy hair and looks so much like Butan that they could be sisters. She will be monitored closely during her quarantine period, even more so because of the possible health risks associated with living so closely with poultry.

The Great Projects volunteers do great work to help the orangutans

Volunteer vet Jesus Mayoral from Spain meets some of the volunteers working hard to help us build our much needed permanent rescue and rehabilitation centre...

Priority 1: Building a new enclosure for our babies

This last month we have been so lucky to have a group of volunteers from The Great Projects team at the centre. They have been sweating and working hard almost every day, either building fences or cementing at the new centre or helping the staff make enrichment for the orangutans. They also constructed a wonderful new play platform at the baby school.

Not only were they fully committed and totally devoted to orangutans, they were really charming people with plenty of experience and knowledge to share with all of us. These are statements from some of them, I hope YOU will be inspired by what they say and want to help us build the new centre too!

Construction of the security tower is under way

Lisa and Noel from the UK:
“Being involved in the early stages of the construction of IAR’s new rehabilitation centre, we felt we were making a truly valuable and very visible contribution to the ongoing rehabilitation work that IAR carries out. The staff is realistic, open and very candid in their approach to rehabilitation, and this, alongside their transparency in where your financial contribution goes, and their obvious embracement and gratitude for the volunteer programme they have, means that we would recommend this programme to you unreservedly over other options in volunteer work with orangutans.

This could be YOU!

“Even though some of the work we have done has been physically demanding and the environment challenging, it’s been a highly rewarding, hugely enjoyable and very memorable experience.”

Fiona from Switzerland:
“I guess, in the end it was this combination that made me loving this project so much: on the one hand, you felt really helpful (even if you didn't bring in some special building skills) and being involved in an important process. And on the other hand, the project also consisted of this element of education - we had the possibility to visit Semengoh and Matang on our first day and - even more important - I learned so much on the days we spent at the IAR Transit Centre and it was just great to get in touch with people who have such a big knowledge and such a big experience in what concerns the orangutan conservation. Also, the whole team never got tired of answering all our questions!”

To find out how you too could volunteer and help orangutans, visit The Great Projects.