Baby Sumatran Orangutan Tripa shares a close relationship with his mom – in fact, Emma has rarely let her baby out of sight since his birth on October 19 at the United Kingdom’s Chester Zoo.
Like all Orangutan infants, Tripa completely depends on his mother for food, transportation, and lots of tender loving care. Orangutans have the longest childhood of all animals other than humans, with young Orangutans spending up to eight years with their mothers.
Photo Credits: Phil Noble/Reuters, Peter Byrne/PA, Chester Zoo
Emma and Puluh, Tripa’s father, are part of the European Endangered Species Programme, which coordinates breeding between zoos to maintain genetic diversity in endangered species.
Conservationists estimate that there are fewer than 7,000 Sumatran Orangutans remaining on the Indonesian island of Sumatra – the only place in the entire world where this Orangutan subspecies exists. Tremendous pressure from illegal logging, illegal palm oil plantations, and poaching have driven wild Orangutan populations to the brink of extinction, making zoo breeding programs essential to their survival.