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Coming up:

OOS Danau Alo Jungle School Report Card

A for Andalas! Andales continues to shine in her jungle school classes. She has built nests and excels in the behavioural enrichment classes, including the hoist feeder system shown here. This is encouraging news towards scheduling a release once she is old enough. Name: Andalas Pancing Sex: Female Age: 5 Arrived: April 2013

Full enrolment at Jungle School in June

Life at OOS Danau Alo field station in recent months has continued its usual productive rhythm. Jungle school is in full swing (excuse the pun), there have been film crews visiting and on 15 June, four new orangutans arrived. The new orangutans mean jungle school is full for the moment with a release scheduled for early August (TBC).

New microchips Orangutan release Once we can implant one of the new microchips, the next jungle school graduate will be able to be released – scheduled for early August 2014.

The new style of microchip is due to arrive at the end of July.

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JUNE 2014 JUNGLE SCHOOL REPORT CARD

Other students progress Dora, Jacky Chan and Franky Gadong are doing

well with behavioural enrichment exercises.

Dora and Jacky Chan

Dora (F, 4, April 2013) and Jacky Chan (M, 4, Oct 2013) are also enjoying their time together for the sessions in the jungle where they play together well and forage successfully.

The past few months have been the leanest time of the year for foraging orangutans as it is the flowering season. This brings the promise of the fruiting season, starting in July, but in the meantime it takes a lot of flowers, leaves and termites to meet their daily energy requirements.

Hence, food is still supplemented with the behavioural enrichment exercises in the cage environment and a well-earned banana or corncob at the end of class.

Cranky Franky Franky Gadong (M, 7, April 2013) has no trouble with the behavioural enrichment exercises but after several years with a human family he definitely picked up some undesirable habits and an unpredictable bad temper (pictured here in a friendly mood). Currently his schooling is cage based as early attempts to provide jungle school in the forest environment were foiled by his aggressive behavior. Staff continue to work with him and monitor progress.

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JUNE 2014 JUNGLE SCHOOL REPORT CARD

New student intake – arrivals in June

It was a long day but great teamwork between the quarantine centre staff and FZS meant all the orangutans arrived in good health and immediately settled in to their new environment.

They ate, checked out their new cage and interacted with their new neighbours and the staff. The trainers will take these new students out for jungle school in the coming days and we look forward watching their progress.

Win Gayo finds a mate… …Hopefully.

Win Gayo, an adult alpha male (check out those check pads) is currently a guest at OOS Danau Alo after repeated stealth raids on the food storage shed at Sungai Pengian field station where he unlocked the door and locked it after him! One of the new arrivals is a seven year old female who may be the solution to Win Gayo’s problems. If they like each other then they could both be released in a remote location away from any field station or village.

On 15 June 2014 FZS Veterinarian Yumni Khairina Ghassani, (pictured here on the right with Medan Quarantine Centre Vet Ihksan Hidayat) received four new orangutans into the care of FZS at OOS Danau Alo field station.

The new arrivals made the long trip from Medan to Simpang Buru, the transfer point where the orangutans were moved from truck to jeep for the final part of the journey to the field station.

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JUNE 2014 JUNGLE SCHOOL REPORT CARD

Teaching the teachers

Learning about food, range, and taking protocol data MEU staff accompanied Jungle School trainer Fatima as she carried out her work with orangutans. This covered food preparation for the behavioural enrichment exercises and explaining what each exercise is designed to teach the orangutan that will help them in the wild.

Then they made the journey with Dora and Jacky Chan to the jungle school area and practiced taking protocol data – what the orangutans eat, how much time they spend feeding/foraging, playing, resting and whether they build nests or display nest

building behaviour.

MEU staff also took part in setting up the cage based exercises included food and leaves placed together into a round ‘puzzle ball’ (pictured left in red) and practicing the use of tools (seen above) where Dora uses a stick to get tasty pieces of fruit and later, the trickier boiled egg task!

New staff of the Mobile Education Unit visited OOS Danau Alo in April to learn about exactly how jungle school and behavioural enrichment works.