Smarter than your average ape.
ADELAIDE, Australia (May 10) - A zoo in Australia was evacuated Sunday after an "ingenious" 137-pound orangutan short-circuited an electric fence and hopped a wall surrounding her enclosure.
The ape, a 27-year-old female named Karta, jammed a stick into wires connected to the fence and then piled up debris to climb a concrete and glass wall at the Adelaide Zoo.
Zoo curator Peter Whitehead told reporters Karta sat on top of the fence for about 30 minutes before apparently changing her mind about the escape and climbing back into the enclosure.
"I think when she actually got out and realized where she was ... she's realized she shouldn't be there so then she's actually hung onto the wall and dropped back into the exhibit," Whitehead said.
Karta came within a few yards of visitors, who were the first to notice the animal's escape bid.
Whitehead said the animal was not aggressive, but the zoo was cleared as a precaution, and veterinarians stood by with tranquilizer guns in case of trouble.
Good for Karta!
A New Orangutan Population
The Orangutan population in the wild is estimated at 50,000 to 60,000, so finding any new population is big news.
Conservationists have discovered a new population of orangutans in a remote, mountainous corner of Indonesia — perhaps as many as 2,000 — giving a rare boost to one of the world's most endangered great apes.A team surveying forests nestled between jagged, limestone cliffs on the eastern edge of Borneo island counted 219 orangutan nests, indicating a "substantial" number of the animals, said Erik Meijaard, a senior ecologist at the U.S.-based The Nature Conservancy.
"We can't say for sure how many," he said, but even the most cautious estimate would indicate "several hundred at least, maybe 1,000 or 2,000 even."
The team also encountered an adult male, which angrily threw branches as they tried to take photos, and a mother and child.
There are an estimated 50,000 to 60,000 orangutans left in the wild, 90 percent of them in Indonesia and the rest in neighboring Malaysia.
The countries are the world's top producers of palm oil, used in food, cosmetics and to meet growing demands for "clean-burning" fuels in the U.S. and Europe. Rain forests, where the solitary animals spend almost all of their time, have been clear-cut and burned at alarming rates to make way for lucrative palm oil plantations.
The steep topography, poor soil and general inaccessibility of the rugged limestone mountains appear to have shielded the area from development, at least for now, said Meijaard. Its trees include those highly sought after for commercial timber.
All very good to know there are still colonies out there, but if they're cut off from other populations, it makes their survival that much harder. Still, as the article says, if there are still population groups coming to light, then it means there's still a chance at conserving them.
Whistling Orangutan Releases CD
This is priceless:
With only days to go before the Eurovision Song Contest, Germany has found the ideal candidate: a whistling orang-utan.
Sadly, entries are closed for Saturday's competition in Moscow but the long-haired, 14-year-old ape is still tipped for stardom. His CD, Ich Bin Ujian ("I Am Ujian"), is due out next month and today he was preparing for the big time by picking lice out of his fur in front of spectators who had gathered at his cage in Heidelberg Zoo.
Ujian has a large lower lip which he learnt to purse when the keeper was slow to dish up his daily supply of fruit and vegetables. Having apparently heard humans whistle, Ujian let out a long irritated piping sound to speed up the serving of his dinner.
The whistling became a habit, and a star was born. “I heard him first when I was visiting the zoo with my son,” Christian Wolf, a music producer, said. Mr Wolf decided to record the ape. Together with the head ape-house keeper, Bernd Kowalsky, he found that Ujian could generate an wide range of whistling sounds — usually before feeding time.
The sounds were recorded and now form the backdrop of the song put together by Tobi — the human singer Tobias Kaemmerer — and the Ape-Band. The proceeds of the CD will go towards building a bigger ape and monkey cage at the zoo.
Apparently the ape also paints:
Ujian appears to be a Renaissance orang-utan, and his paintings are going on auction this week — something to fall back on if the musical career does not work out.
Talent is everywhere if you only look, my friends!
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