Orangutan's favorite food. Orangutan monkey - photo of orangutan - great apes orangutan. Status of the species in nature

Orangutan- A great arboreal ape, the largest living arboreal ape. In Malay, "orangutan" means "forest man" or " wild man" There are two known living species of orangutans: the Kalimantan (Pongo pygmaeus) and the Sumatran (Pongo abelii) orangutans. They are also often called "orangutans", but this name is incorrect and is not used in zoology.
Squad: Primates
Family: Hominidae
General information
Males are up to 1.5 meters tall, females are about 1 meter tall. The weight of males ranges from 50 to 100 kilograms. Females - 30 - 50 kilograms. The Kalimantan orangutan is somewhat larger in size.
Females mature at 8-12 years, males at 14-15. Pregnancy lasts approximately 8.5 months, giving birth to 1 - 2 cubs weighing 1.5-2 kilograms. The cubs are fed with mother's milk for three to four years and live with her for about 6-8 years. In the wild they live for about 30 years, and in captivity - up to 65 years, which puts them in second place in terms of life expectancy among primates after humans.
Life of orangutans
Orangutans live in the tropical forests of Borneo and Sumatra, spending almost all their time in the trees. They move by brachiation, assisting themselves with their legs. The adaptation of orangutans to life in trees has reached the point that they even drink from leaves, hollows, etc. They move on the ground on all fours and spend the night in nests they weave in the trees. Not able to swim. The orangutan's arm span is about 2 meters.
Orangutans live alone and only cubs live with their mothers, and sometimes there are groups of two females. The females, having met, behave calmly and even feed together, while the males stage a show of strength, each remaining within their own territory: they growl, break branches, etc. When none of them retreats, a fight occurs, during which one of the opponents, as a rule, retreats.
Orangutans are predominantly herbivorous; however, they do not disdain insects, honey, eggs, chicks, and Sumatran orangutans even hunt slow lorises.
Orangutans have a fairly developed language of communication among themselves: whining and sobbing in it can mean anger, displeasure, discomfort; loud squelching and grunting indicate threat; the fear-inducing piercing roar of the male (the so-called “long cry”) can communicate a territorial claim, or can serve to attract a female; the extraordinary sonority and expressiveness of this roar is imparted by the bag that orangutans have - a resonator, with a volume of several liters. At the same time, it was long believed that orangutans hardly make any sounds.

The metabolic rate of orangutans is about a third less than that calculated based on body weight and is comparable to that of sloths. Therefore, orangutans can go for several days without food at all. It is believed that this feature developed in orangutans due to their predominantly fruit diet.
Like humans, orangutans can be addicted to tobacco and alcohol. And, at least in the 19th century, they tried to use them as servants. These facts were even reflected in the book “The Mysterious Island” by the great science fiction writer of that century, Jules Verne.
Orangutans are considered the most intelligent animals after humans. When kept in captivity, they adopt many of the traits, modes of action and habits of the people around them.

In addition, orangutans are the closest living primates to humans, after chimpanzees and gorillas.
Preservation
Outside of zoos may become extinct due to the destruction of their places of residence, since even despite the organization national parks, illegal deforestation continues. The removal of cubs from their mother by poachers for subsequent sale also makes a contribution, during which the mother is usually killed, since she actively protects them.

The risk of extinction of the Sumatran orangutan is critical, the Kalimantan orangutan is in danger of extinction.

Interesting video about orangutan

The orangutan is one of the three most famous apes. Together with the gorilla and chimpanzee, he is one of the animals closest to humans. You can often find an erroneous spelling of the name of this animal - orangutan. But the word "orangutan" in the local language means "debtor", and the word "orangutan" is translated as "forest man". There are two known species of orangutans - Bornean and Sumatran.

Bornean orangutan (Pongo pygmaeus).

The appearance of these monkeys is very unique and unlike any other animal. In an upright position, the height of orangutans is only 120-140 cm, but their weight can reach 80-140 kg, in rare cases even 180 kg! This is due to the fact that orangutans have relatively short limbs and a thick belly, therefore, despite their small size, these animals have heavy weight. The body of orangutans is rather square in shape, the limbs are strong and muscular. Orangutans' arms are so long that in a vertical position they hang below their knees, but their legs, on the contrary, are short and crooked. The feet and palms are large, both on the arms and legs thumb opposed to the others. This makes it easier to grip branches when climbing trees. At the ends of the fingers there are nails like those of a person. The skull of orangutans is convex with a highly developed facial part. The eyes are close set, the nostrils are relatively small. These animals have well-developed facial muscles and often grimace. Orangutans have well-expressed sexual dimorphism (differences in the body structure of males and females): females are smaller and thinner (up to 50 kg), males are not only heavier, but also have a special ridge of skin around the face. This ridge forms the facial disc, which is especially pronounced in old males; in addition, males have more pronounced mustaches and beards on their faces. The color of the fur of young animals is fiery red, while that of older animals is darker - brown.

The body of orangutans is covered with long, rather sparse hair, which hangs down like a fringe in older animals.

Orangutans live only on the islands of Borneo and Sumatra in the Malay Archipelago, that is, their natural range is relatively small. In nature, these animals inhabit exclusively rainforests, and carried out on trees most life, rarely descending to earth. They move through trees, moving from branch to branch, and where the distance between neighboring trees is large, orangutans use flexible thin trunks or vines. When moving, these monkeys often hang by their hands and generally use their forelimbs more actively than their hindlimbs. Unlike other monkeys, heavy orangutans do not jump from branch to branch. Despite this, signs of broken arms and legs are sometimes found in old animals.

Orangutans use tree branches to sleep at night: more often they sleep directly on the branches, sometimes they build primitive nests in the crowns.

A distinctive feature of these animals is their solitary lifestyle, which is generally not characteristic of primates. Orangutans differ sharply in their habits from other species of monkeys: they are extremely quiet and silent, their voices are rarely heard in the forest. Their character is very calm and peaceful. Orangutans never get into fights, behave imposingly, and move slowly. We can say that they have a certain intelligence. In the forest, each animal has its own area, but protecting the territory does not involve aggression. Orangutans avoid human proximity and, instead of visiting human settlements in search of food, seek solitude in the depths of the forest. When caught, they do not offer strong resistance.

Orangutans eat plant foods- leaves and fruits of trees, occasionally they eat eggs of birds and small animals. They collect food in the crowns, leisurely picking and chewing shoots. Like many monkeys, orangutans do not like water, so they avoid swimming across rivers, and when it rains, they cover their heads with torn leaves.

An orangutan carefully examines the contents of the egg it has just eaten.

These animals reproduce all year round. To attract a female, the male begins to roar loudly throughout the forest. If there are several rivals, they each try to lure the female to their side with their songs, but they rarely leave the boundaries of their own territory. The female selects the strongest gentleman by sound and visits his territory to mate. Pregnancy lasts 8.5 months. The female gives birth to one, or less often two, cubs weighing 1.5-2 kg. The newborn is covered with rather long hair and clings tightly to the mother's skin.

A female orangutan tenderly cares for her baby.

At first, the female holds the baby on her chest, then the grown baby moves onto the mother’s back. The mother feeds the cub with milk until he is 2-3 years old, then he accompanies her for another couple of years. Only at the age of 5-6 years do orangutans begin independent life. They become sexually mature at the age of 10-15 years, and live on average 45-50. Thus, during her life, a female can raise no more than 5-6 cubs, that is, orangutans are extremely infertile.

A baby orangutan learns to climb “vines.”

IN natural environment this does not matter, since large orangutans living on treetops have practically no enemies. But nevertheless, these animals are very rare. Orangutan numbers are declining due to extermination tropical forests. The already small range of these monkeys has declined catastrophically over the past 40 years. In recent decades, another problem has been added to the destruction of forests - poaching. As orangutans become increasingly rare, their price on the black market increases and everything larger number hunters go into the forest for prey. Often hunters kill the mother just to take the cub away.

Female orangutan with baby.

Young orangutans are resold to private zoos, but not for breeding. The usual fate of such animals is to be a toy for people. Taking advantage of the fact that orangutans are very smart, learn quickly and do not show aggression even as adults, they are taught all sorts of tricks, grimaces and even bad habits.

Ticket Moscow - Bali - 500 dollars, Bali - Java - 40 dollars, Java - Borneo - 30 dollars, boat to the national park - 600 dollars, getting hit in the neck by an orangutan - priceless

Human DNA is 50% identical to banana DNA. Do we consider bananas to be distant relatives? Most likely no. What if the DNA matches more than 95%?

U great apes DNA match with human DNA is from 96.5% (in orangutans) to 98.4% (in chimpanzees). However, in total morphological features modern man is an order of magnitude more similar to an orangutan than to a chimpanzee, and for us this is intuitively more important than DNA similarity.

Orangutans, for example, are the only great apes (other than humans) to have a beard and mustache. These monkeys widely use tools. And not only labor - let’s say, when it rains, they can easily build themselves an umbrella. The cubs live with their mother for up to eight years, that is, for quite a long time. And the Malays generally considered their orangutan neighbors to be not like humans, but rather people, just a little different.

On two distant islands

Tourists can take a boat ride along the rivers of Tanjungputing National Park

Our guide studied and worked at Camp Leakey at this reserve, the main international field center for the study and rehabilitation of wild orangutans. His boss and mentor - Professor Birutė Galdikas. great woman, who devoted her life to the study and protection of orangutans and, among other things, achieved the creation of a national park in their habitat. She founded Camp Leakey in 1971 and still works here, visiting her wooden house at the research center from time to time. Speaking about the professor, the guide lowers his voice reverently. Indeed, it is difficult to believe how much one woman can do on an island, country and world scale just from the love of monkeys. It's hard until you see these monkeys with your own eyes.

Ethologist Birute Galdikas with his students

Study, study and study again

Even from the photographs it is clear: orangutans are fascinating creatures. Moreover, they are the quietest, most modest and even intelligent of our closest relatives. Translated from Malay, “orang utan” means “forest man”. Local residents believe that orangutans are real people who went to live in the forest and stopped talking so that they would not be forced to work. Orangutans, like real intellectuals, really don’t like to do hard physical labor (just kidding). But they love to learn (and this is no longer a joke).

Orangutans are not afraid to go into water, but they cannot swim like humans.

The most popular teaching method They, like all monkeys, have ape-like behavior. Orangutans are great masters of imitation. For example, they saw how local residents they catch fish, and now, too, sometimes they sit on the shore with twigs and “fish for something.” The orangs, of course, don’t catch anything, but such a trifle never stopped a real fisherman.

Orangutans cannot swim, although they are not usually afraid of water, but the guide tells how one young male learned to use an empty plastic canister as a flotation device. He hugged her with one arm and rowed with the other. And the young female Princess even mastered the canoe, using her hands as oars.

Female Sisvi scratches her leg. She is a descendant of those orangutans that were raised in the Liki camp.

Orangutans really have hands everywhere. With a maximum height of 150 cm, the arm span reaches more than two meters. But this is an adaptation not for rowing, but for life in the trees. Orangutans often move using brachiation: they “walk” by grabbing branches with their hands and moving their legs. Brachiation is actually walking upright with the help of your arms. There is a hypothesis that this type of movement was once characteristic of all ancient great primates. But only orangutans and humans remained, while gorillas and chimpanzees switched to the evolutionarily advanced walking on their knuckles. That is, we and orangutans are also united by loyalty to the “old school” technique of movement. But orangutans avoid jumping from branch to branch: they are too heavy. But even this precaution does not save, and in the bones, especially of old males, healed fractures are often found - traces of past falls.

Orangutans have few enemies other than humans. The Sumatran tiger does not climb trees, and the clouded leopard cannot cope with a large male. And it’s not so easy with a female. In case of danger orangutans break branches And they fight very cleverly or they simply throw something heavier at the attacker. One enraged male almost killed Birutė Galdikas herself by throwing a huge club at her.

One Hundred Years of Solitude

Orangutans are the only anthropoids that lead a solitary lifestyle. Chimpanzees and bonobos have group marriages, gorillas have a harem, while male orangutans and females with their cubs live strictly separately and meet only when the female needs the next cub. And this happens infrequently - once every 6–7 years. This love of solitude is surprising, since high intelligence is usually combined with complex social structure and developed relationships between group members. But studies of orangutans have shown that their groups collapsed quite recently, no more than a few hundred years ago, and this was probably due to a drop in forest productivity and anthropogenic pressure on the population. Moreover, in Sumatra, orangutans remained closer to the group format: the dominant male controls large territory, which includes enclaves of several females with cubs. But the semblance of a marriage-pair is formed only during the breeding season.

Female Tutut, camp “Liki”

Moreover, orangutans have developed a technique for determining the character of the groom and his matrimonial suitability. “They approached the dining male and stole some delicacy from him, but did not run far, but remained to watch the reaction of the robbed. If he began to be indignant and showed aggression, demanding the return of food, the females ran away screaming. But if the male took the incident calmly, the female remained with him and in most cases, in the near future, became his sexual partner. By stealing food, sexually active females test the level of aggressiveness of males,” the magazine reports. Behavioral Ecology and Sociobiology.

The hypothesis of a recent loss of the group way of life is also supported by strong sexual dimorphism. In truly solitary animals, males and females are almost indistinguishable from each other. In orangutans, males are sometimes twice as large, more powerful and shaggy than females; their heads are decorated with a massive facial disc of skin and fat. Another unique feature of orangutans is the presence of two forms of males, dominants with a developed facial disc and subdominants without it. Females, of course, prefer darker males, and mate less willingly with those without growths. But whether the development of the facial disc depends on genes and whether this is a congenital or acquired trait is still unknown.

In addition to purely aesthetic value, the facial disc serves as a resonator for males, enhancing their hoots, roars, screams and a host of other sounds (the situation is approximately the same in owls - see). Orangutans have a very complex and varied vocal language that helps them communicate in the dense forest: further evidence of only recently lost sociality. The meanings of some “words” are intuitive to us, while others come as a surprise. For example, a smacking sound does not mean “come for a kiss,” but “get out of here, or you’ll get it.” And a mistake in translation can cost you dearly.

Adult male Nanang in the forest

As is common among great apes, adolescents who have recently separated from their mother practice social skills by gathering in so-called gangs. We even saw one of these: five young orangutans sat sedately on neighboring trees, slowly and carefully eating leaves. No fights, no noise, nothing. Gang of nerds.

Orangutans have a couple of hundred types of fruits and edible plants, but most of all they love ripe durian (this “king of fruits” packed in a prickly skin with the taste of creme brulee and the smell of rotten baked onions drives not only orangutans crazy). It is believed that the droppings of orangutans that have eaten durian are one of the most stinking substances in the world. But this is the opinion of those who simply do not like orangutans and durians.

However, fruit abundance in the jungle is rare, and most of the year orangutans are content with the green parts of plants. Or they even live from hand to mouth, without experiencing any particular discomfort from this - their metabolic level is only slightly higher than that of sloths. Only females with cubs cannot afford to go hungry and, on occasion, even hunt slow lorises (small primates).

But when the fruit season comes in the jungle and there is no need to go to the feeding areas that the national park organizes for them, orangutans do not show themselves. And only our incredible luck can explain the fact that we still met quite a lot of them, about three dozen. They sat in the trees on both sides of the river, made nests, ate termites, nursed children, and we even shook hands with one red-haired beauty. And then they hit her lightly in the neck. Because every wild orangutan girl should be able to tell strangers off.

Mothering

The cub learns from other anthropoids by looking at all members of the group. Fathers, mothers, grandmothers, aunts, uncles, older brothers - the world is gaining skills one by one adult life. And only the mother teaches the baby orangutan. Therefore, orangutans have a long childhood, they are fed milk until they are four years old, and then live with their mother for another couple of years. Every good orangutan mother should teach her child many things, such as:

The cub hangs for 8–9 months, clinging to the mother’s fur.

Orangutans are very responsible mothers, and until they teach the baby all the vital wisdom, they will not have another. As a result, orangutans rarely reproduce in nature. Males, of course, would be happy to spread their genes more often, but do not have such an opportunity. If you come to a female without an invitation, she will simply climb higher and blow kisses from there to mean “go away.” And the male leaves. What can he do? He weighs about a hundredweight, she is half as much, and all attempts to catch up with the female will end with him falling and breaking something. It's better to wait for an invitation.

In captivity, relationships between orangutans are different, and females have to get used to the constant company of a male again. But cubs are born in nurseries more often on average, once every four years.

In general, wild orangutans are afraid of people and avoid them. And there is a reason for this: people really annoyed them a lot. Due to poaching, and even more due to the clearing of the jungle for oil palm plantations, the number of wild orangutans has decreased to endangered in Kalimantan and critical in Sumatran. In order to somehow improve the situation, Birute Galdikas opened an adaptation nursery for baby orangutans left without a mother at the Liki camp. Humans have literally replaced primates my own mother: fed, cared for the cubs and taught everything that a self-sufficient orangutan should be able to do. Above the path in the depths of the forest we were met by the daughter of one of those “graduates”. The guide recognized her: “Ursula, Ursula!” Ursula looked at us with curiosity and without fear. She was born and raised in the jungle, but she learned from her mother that people are not dangerous. You can play with them, but if they get boring, you can drive them away with a branch.

Of course, I had to dodge the branch. But in general, it’s great when a representative of the first unafraid generation of wild orangutans drives you away from their territory.

Photo: SPL / Legion-media, NPL / Legion-media (x6), iStock, Alamy / Legion-media

Orangutan: lifestyle, nutrition, reproduction

The orangutan is the second largest primate species after the gorilla. It is found only on the islands of Sumatra and Kalimantan. The population size of this species is rapidly declining.Orangutans spend a significant part of their lives high in the treetops. Orangutans are active in daytime. Every evening, males and females with their young build simple nests in which they spend the night. Orangutans find a suitable place in a fork and there they build a platform with special handrails from branches and leaves, on which they then lay. Despite its considerable weight, this “bed” is the safest. All orangutans sleep on their sides holding a twig. Before going to bed, they also cover themselves with branches. At dusk, the orangutans begin to make a new bed.

These animals are not as friendly as other monkeys, so they stay alone or in small groups. Adult males usually stay away. Orangutans occupy a large individual area and, having met another male there, drive out the violator of territorial boundaries..jpg">

Animal nutrition The basis of the orangutan's diet is fruits and tree leaves, bark, nuts, rambutan fruits, and sometimes insects and bird eggs. When there is enough fruit, orangutans stay in one place for a long time. Sometimes you can see many animals on a tree covered with fruits, but they rarely come into close contact. Orangutans are very smart. They remember places where they found a lot of fruit and can determine when to expect a new harvest again. Depending on this, animals walk many kilometers through the forest in search of their favorite food. When it is necessary to quench their thirst, animals find a hollow where water collects. They plunge their hand into the water and suck the wet fur.

How do orangutans reproduce? Orangutans do not form permanent alliances. The dominant male occupies a large area and mates with many females. He spends several days with the female, which are favorable in her 28-day cycle. Mating occurs all year round, and the moment the baby is born does not depend on a particular season, because different trees bear fruit in different time, that is, there is enough food throughout the year. Every 3-5 years, the female gives birth to one cub, which grows very slowly. Only after years does the young orangutan become partially independent.

As the population increases, the habitats of orangutans are being mercilessly destroyed. Huge areas are being cut down tropical jungle for timber harvesting or agricultural land. Such deforestation, despite the government ban, also occurs on the territory of nature reserves and national parks. Another threat is the demand for babies, as exotic lovers keep orangutans at home. The consequence of this was a catastrophic reduction in their numbers after World War II. Due to slow reproduction, the population does not reproduce in nature.

Despite the ban on the export and import of animals by the governments of Hong Kong and Singapore, the orangutan is seriously endangered. There are programs for breeding in nurseries and its further introduction into the wild.