EARTH DAY 2024: PLANET VS PLASTICS
Every year on April 22, we celebrate Earth Day to honour the planet that is home to us all.
On December 12th, the BOS Foundation's Orangutan Rehabilitation Center at Samboja Lestari received yet another orphaned baby orangutan. This tiny baby, a little boy who we have named Joey, is estimated to be around three or four months old. He arrived at Samboja Lestari sleeping peacefully in a red plastic basket with a white teddy bear by his side.
Following an initial health check by our vet team, Joey weighs two kilograms and was declared healthy without any physical injuries and showing no indication of illness. However, he was cold and very hungry. One of our experienced babysitters immediately wrapped Joey in a warm blanket and gave him warm milk to restore his condition. As at the time of writing this story, Joey is now in stable condition.
Joey was found by a man named Sugianor who reported that he found the infant in a field near an palm oil plantation belonging to PT. Anugrah, Hambur Batu, in East Kalimantan. According to that report there was no sign of Joey's mother. Sugianor then handed Joey over to Rahmad Suba, a Lecturer at the Forestry Department of Mulawarman University, who was conducting a socialisation project in the area.
Despite being cold and hungry, but overall Joey was in a good condition
Joey when he first arrived at Samboja Lestari, sleeping in his red basket
Rahmad contacted the Centre for Orangutan Protection (COP) and talked to Ramadhani, a staff member of COP, about the baby orangutan. Upon hearing the news about Joey, Ramadhani coordinated with Conservation and Natural Resources Authority (BKSDA) and called the BOS Foundation so the baby could receive appropriate treatment and care he needed.
At Samboja Lestari, Joey is now being cared for by our babysitters, just like our other young orangutans at the rehabilitation center. Because Joey has lost his mother at this very young age, in the future Joey will join our forest school program to learn all the necessary skills he will need to survive in the wild. But that will be around 7 years from now. Young orangutans would naturally stay with their mothers for 6-8 years, learning the many lessons and skills they need to survive in the forest.
Welcome to Samboja Lestari, little Joey. We know you should be in the forest with your mother, but we will do our absolute best to make sure one day you can safely go home.
Every year on April 22, we celebrate Earth Day to honour the planet that is home to us all.
It was a usual day at the Nyaru Menteng forest school, where young orangutans were learning from one another while their human surrogate mothers looked on from below.
Our Post-Release Monitoring (PRM) team at Camp Himba Pambelum in Bukit Baka Bukit Raya National Park (TNBBBR), Central Kalimantan, encountered Suci, a young female orangutan, three times back in 2023.
