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Baby orangutan found alone, crying in C. Kalimantan plantation
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A seven-month old orangutan given by local people to the Central Kalimantan Natural Resources Conservation Agency( BKSDA) on July 20. (Antara/Adeng Bustomi)
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local man on Wednesday found a baby Bornean orangutan crying in a rubber plantation in Sampit, East Kotawaringin regency, Central Kalimantan, alone and with no sign of its mother.
The man, Martono, said he had found the baby orangutan on Wednesday afternoon in his plantation.
"I heard a crying sound in the afternoon and after looking around, I saw a baby orangutan crying in a rubber tree in my plantation. I sought it out again this morning and realized its mother was not around so I brought it home to Sampit," he said on Thursday as reported by Antara news agency.
Martono then reported the discovery to the Central Kalimantan Natural Resources Conservation Agency (BKSDA), noting that the young primate was thin and starving, probably as a result of deforestation caused by massive peatland and forest fires last year.
"I made the report so the authorities could save the baby. I gave it a banana but it only ate a bit of it. I have to carry it everywhere, otherwise it starts to cry," he said.
BKSDA officials came to Martono's house to pick up the baby on Thursday. Based on preliminary examination, the young orangutan is a female aged a year and a half, BKSDA Sampit official Muriansyah said, adding that given the unlikelihood of a mother abandoning her infant, the baby's mother was probably dead.
The officials are set to take the baby orangutan to their office in Pangkalan Bun in West Kotawaringin regency; it will take months or even years to rehabilitate the baby orangutan before it can be released back into the wilds of the jungle, Muriansyah added. (rin)
