Monkey business: meet the orangutans of Sarawak, Malaysia
Being able to witness orangutans swinging through the canopies of Semenggoh Wildlife Centre is a magnificent privilege. Take a journey to the heart of Sarawak to see how these charismatic great apes are protected.
The Semenggoh Wildlife Centre has an orangutan skeleton on display. Used for educational purposes, it’s also a reminder of the drama often found at the heart of a community of orangutans: this particular individual died in a fight with the dominant male. It’s a drama that’s familiar to Murtadza Othman, the senior park ranger, who’s worked at the orangutan sanctuary for more than 20 years. He’s seen both sides — the frictions and the tenderness. “I’ve been here so long that the orangutans recognise my voice,” he tells me when we meet at the entrance. “I’ve built up a relationship with them, almost like a father.” He was once in the forest when an orangutan sat beside him and picked an ant off his shoulder; that’s how much the animals trust him.
But this isn’t a zoo. Semenggoh Wildlife Centre — which was named after the river that runs through the 2.5sq mile nature reserve, 12 miles south of Sarawak’s capital of Kuching — was established in the 1970s as a rehabilitation centre for orangutans that had been injured, orphaned or rescued from illegal captivity. Once the primates had been nursed back to health, they were released into the reserve. While Semenggoh no longer functions as a place of rehab, its forest remains a safe space for a colony of around 40 of those original orangutans and their descendants.
Living without borders
Most of the orangutans were born in the wild and — because there are no fences — can roam where they wish. An adult male requires a territory of at least 1.5sq miles, so when an individual reaches maturity he must decide whether to fight for the right to be the troop’s kingpin or leave to find a different patch. Ritchie, the troop’s original boss — named after the journalist who rescued him and brought him to the centre in the 1980s — moved on when a pair of stronger youngsters finally challenged his dominance. Others choose to go for different reasons, and sometimes come back, too. “One orangutan called Roxanne moved away for seven years before returning with a baby,” Murtadza tells me.
But there’s a very good incentive to stay in the reserve. Scattered through the forest are several purpose-built wooden platforms, which the rangers stock with food. Between November and February, fruit is plentiful in the trees, and the orangutans remain high in the canopy. But for the rest of the year, the platforms provide nutritious meals that are carefully put together by the rangers using a seven-day food planner pinned to the wall of the storeroom (itself now fitted with a reinforced iron door after a night-time raid by a couple of opportunist orangutans).
Front-row conservation
Orangutan means ‘man of the forest’ in Malay, and these great apes are as charismatic as they are fragile. “Humans and orangutans share around 97% of the same DNA,” says Murtadza. “These animals do so many things just like us. Sometimes I’ll see them copying me when I’m working in the forest — making sawing or hammering actions.” They’re also endangered, with a population of only about 2,000 remaining in Sarawak. Semenggoh performs an important function, not only in protecting them but in educating visitors so that the conservation message can spread.
Twice a day — morning and afternoon — visitors can come to a viewing area in a clearing near the main feeding platform in the hope of seeing some orangutans descend from the trees. I follow the trail that leads there through the lowland dipterocarp forest. While orangutans are the star attraction at the reserve, this protected area allows other flora and fauna to thrive, too. More than 200 plant species have been recorded, including a palm called Areca Ahmadii, which is endemic to Semenggoh. I keep my eyes sharp for giant squirrels and wild boars, and listen for the calls of bulbuls, kingfishers and barbets.
“There are no guarantees any orangutans will come,” warns Murtadza as we get closer to the clearing. But then he stops me and points upwards. Away to our left, high in the canopy, the branches are swaying and swishing as something moves through the trees. We’re in luck. We climb some steps to the viewing area and, as we do so, a female orangutan with a youngster clinging to her back emerges from the forest. She makes her way hand over foot along a rope strung diagonally from midway up a tree down to the feeding platform on its wooden stilts.
This is Minah, a 35-year-old who was rescued from a cage in the 1980s, and has since had four offspring. I watch as she eats a banana, stripping every bit of flesh by dragging the inside of the skin across her upper teeth. “They don’t waste anything,” says Murtadza. She seems wary, waiting at the platform edge to check that all is well, before considering the food on offer. Today’s menu features bananas, sweet potatoes, coconuts and sugarcane. She grabs a couple of bananas and retreats to the edge once more, a hand on the rope in case she needs to make a swift exit.
The leading player
And then the mood changes. Minah stuffs three sweet potatoes into her mouth, grabs a third in one hand and a coconut in the other, and clambers back up the rope to the tree. Annuar has appeared on the platform. He’s the current alpha male, weighing 15½ stone and with wide cheek pads that run like a helmet around his face. He watches Minah for a moment, but she’s a safe distance away.
Annuar is an intimidating specimen. He tears the outer layer from a coconut before breaking the shell on the side of the platform and pouring the milk into his mouth. He became the dominant male after a vicious fight with Edwin, his rival, who had once been his friend. This is real soap-opera stuff.
It’s a privilege to get close to these incredible animals, and to read about them in the visitor centre. It’s through the opportunity the reserve offers for such engagement — and the money this generates — that Semenggoh is playing its part in protecting the future of Sarawak’s orangutans.
There are regular flights to Kuching from Heathrow via Singapore, Brunei or Kuala Lumpur. For more information on Sarawak and Semenggoh Wildlife Centre, visit sarawaktourism.com