Orangutans Sayang and Padma Surprise the Team!
Date Posted April 28, 2022
Text by BOS Foundation Post-Release Monitoring Team
Last September, our Post-Release Monitoring (PRM) team from Camp Lesik, in the northern part of the Kehje Sewen Forest, East Kalimantan, conducted a routine phenology survey. Phenology involves observing how living things respond to changes in the seasons and climate of the environment in which they live.
During the survey, the team was taking a break when team member Hilal noticed some movement in the trees. He paid little attention to this until another member, Usup, stood up in surprise; the movement in the trees turned out to be from an orangutan! Usup, Hilal, and Beni, another team member, took a closer look to identify the orangutan they had found in the Gunung Belah phenological area. From a distance, they soon realised that the movements in the trees were not from one but two orangutans.
Upon closer inspection, the team immediately recognised the two orangutans as Sayang and her offspring, Padma. How lovely it was to see Sayang and Padma in the middle of the forest looking for food. Prior to this, the team had only seen the two around the Camp Lesik area. However, the mother-daughter pair hadn't visited the camp for a long time and our team members had missed seeing them around.
Our team members were even more delighted to see that Sayang and Padma looked to be in good health, as indicated by their stable Body Condition Scores - ideal for orangutan bodies in the wild.
The team soon moved on to continue with the phenology survey, worried that Sayang and her daughter were getting too close and might become disturbed by the team’s presence. The team returned to camp as soon as the survey was completed, leaving Sayang and Padma free to continue their adventures in the forest.
We hope Sayang and Padma stay in good health and continue to thrive in the wild!
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