Orangutan fact sheet
Orangutans are highly intelligent animals, sharing approximately 96% of our DNA. The name orangutan comes from the Malay word ‘orang’ for person, and ‘hutan’ which means forest, literally ‘person of the forest’. Orangutans are the largest tree-dwelling species in the world.
SCIENTIFIC NAME: Pongo pygmaeus (Bornean orangutan) Pongo abelii (Sumatran orangutan)
CLASS: Mammalia
ORDER: Primates
FAMILY: Pongidae (great apes)
DISTRIBUTION: Borneo and Sumatra
SIZE AND APPEARANCE
Adult male orangutans are almost double the size of females, growing up to five feet in height and 120 kilograms on average in weight. The males have large cheek pads and a large pouch of skin under their chin. Orangutans have evolved for a life in the trees with both hands and feet adapted for gripping branches.HABIT
DIET
Orangutans spend a large part of their day roaming the forest for widely distributed food sources. They eat leaves, tree bark, buds, stems and fruit, and occasionally insects, although they are mainly frugivorous (fruit eaters).
LIFE EXPECTANCY
RANGE OF THE ORANGUTAN
Orangutans live in scattered populations in South East Asia on the islands of Borneo and Sumatra. Their habitat is tropical forest, which offers them access to a wide range of food. They are the only member of the ape family to be found in Asia.CONSERVATION & THREATS
Ten thousand years ago, orangutans ranged as far north as China and as far south as Java in Indonesia. Now they are only present on the islands of Borneo and Sumatra with best estimates of population sizes at around 22,000 and 5,000 on the islands, respectively.
Orangutans are now the most highly endangered of the great apes as a result of destruction of their habitat and capture for the bushmeat or pet trade. A low reproductive rate, long-life spans and long birth intervals makes them particularly vulnerable. Though totally protected by law in Indonesia and by the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species, enforcement is extremely difficult in most areas.
The greatest threat facing orangutans is destruction of their rainforest habitat by commercial logging and conversion of forests to plantations and agriculture. Under ideal conditions these solitary animals roam the forests in search of widely distributed food sources but reduction of suitable habitat is forcing orangutan populations into smaller areas which cannot support them. In the last 20 years, an estimated 80% of orangutan habitat has been lost.
Logging also opens up roads into previously inaccessible areas to poachers for whom the slow-moving orangutan is an easy target. Orangutans are killed for their meat or captured as infants to be sold into the exotic pet trade. In the process of capture, the mother is usually killed.