Please help us build more forested island sanctuaries

As the end of the financial year comes to a close, we really need your help to release more rehabilitated orangutans safely back to the wild where they belong.

We are overjoyed to have permanently released 31 orangutans back to their rainforest home in the past 12 months, but there are so many more waiting.

We currently have 70 adult males at OFI’s Orangutan Care Centre and Quarantine who need to master the last of their vital survival skills before they can be permanently released. We urgently need to build more forested island sanctuaries to provide them with a training ground to do this … their final stepping stone to freedom.

Please help us by making a tax-deductible donation by 30 June. Your donation may not only reduce your taxable income, it will also help more rehabilitated orangutans return to the wild.

Please make a tax-deductible donation today!

Watch orangutans Hayes and Janghis being released into a haha.

We are facing a crisis

When wild adult male orangutans mature and become flanged (develop their cheek pads), they become intolerant of other males. The same thing happens at the Care Centre. When males reach this stage of development, they require their own individual sleeping enclosure, large enough for them to move about freely and swing from ropes. These adult males can only be released to Forest School one at a time, in separate areas of the forest, unlike females who can be released in groups. When permanently released to the wild, large mature males must be released on their own, where there isn’t a dominant wild male orangutan already present.

When the COVID-19 pandemic hit in 2020, the Care Centre was forced into lockdown, just like the rest of the world. The National Parks closed and orangutans could not be released back to the wild. All our efforts were focused on keeping the orangutans and human staff safe from the virus. Fortunately, no orangutans in our facilities ever contracted COVID-19, but many of them are still suffering from the consequences of the lockdowns.

For over four years OFI was not permitted to release any orangutans back to the wild due to Indonesian Government restrictions and National Park closures. Meanwhile, the orangutans at the Care Centre continued to grow. Now, years after the COVID-19 lockdowns, we are faced with a large cohort of adult males who have developed into cheek-padders, who desperately need to be released to the wild.

We are now facing a crisis where we have 70 large males needing to be released, however they don’t yet have the skills, or a safe place in the wild in which to be released.

Orangutans waiting to be released

Island sanctuaries provide the perfect training ground

Before a rehabilitated orangutan can be released, we must be confident they have developed all the essential life skills and knowledge they need to thrive and live safely in the wild. This includes being able to move freely through the forest, forage for food and build nests to sleep high up in the trees each night.

The best way to do this is to provide our orangutans with a training ground where they can practice and refine these skills. That’s where our forested island sanctuaries, also known as hahas, come in!

Our hahas are man-made island sanctuaries of tropical rainforest, surrounded by a perimeter wall with a dry moat. We currently have three hahas ranging in size between one and two hectares (2.5 to 5 acres). A fourth haha is in the final stage of construction. Each haha can accommodate up to four orangutans at a time including one cheek-padder.

Hahas provide orangutans with the unique opportunity to fine tune their survival skills and practice everything they learned at Forest School while living in relative freedom. This essential stage in the rehabilitation process allows our carers to assess each individual orangutan’s skill level and determine their readiness for release while we search for appropriate protected release sites.

We urgently need to build more hahas so we can safely acclimatise our large adult male orangutans to life in the wild before they are permanently released.

OFI carers teaching infant orangutans at Forest School

Meet Ricky

Ricky arrived at the Orangutan Care Centre and Quarantine as a young adolescent who self-identified with people after being kept since infancy as an illegal pet. When he was first released into a haha, Ricky refused to climb trees and slept on the ground. He was quite timid around his three female orangutan companions, often engaging with playful slaps rather than standing his ground.

Now, after six years living in a haha, Ricky climbs like an expert and moves through the trees with ease. He has finally started building nests and now sleeps in the canopy. Ricky’s behavioural change has been remarkable. He vocalizes long calls and displays at humans. He even holds his own against the adult female orangutans who once intimidated him. It took six years, but thanks to his time in the haha, he has been able to overcome his traumas and learn how to be an orangutan again. He is a completely new individual.

We are confident Ricky will thrive when his time comes to be permanently released back to the wild.

Ricky has completely transformed thanks to his time in a haha

Giving hope to our unreleasable orangutans

While the hahas are a vital component of our rehabilitation program, they also play another important role for unreleasable orangutans.

Unfortunately, for various reasons, there are orangutans that may never be released back into the wild and are destined to spend the remainder of their lives in captivity under OFI’s care.

Many of these orangutans suffer from physical injuries or illness preventing their release. Others require extra care and compassion due to the trauma they have suffered in their past. Whatever the reason, these orangutans are not capable of fending for themselves and would not survive on their own in the wild.

Sadly, as much as we desperately want to return all of our orangutans to their wild forest home, we simply can’t. The best we can do is provide them with a comfortable enclosure and lots of enrichment to keep them mentally stimulated and encourage physical movement.

Our dream is to also build hahas for these unreleasable orangutans so they can live the remainder of their lives in relative freedom, surrounded by forest while still receiving the love and care from OFI they need to survive.

Montana, who is unreleasable due to severe injuries, finds freedom in a haha

Why we need your help

Unfortunately, there is limited space in our existing hahas, and we desperately need to create many more.

We currently have over 230 orangutans under our care, with 70 large males waiting to be released.

Each haha requires extensive construction work to create a moat with a steel reinforced concrete perimeter wall and the supporting infrastructure needed to protect the orangutans and keep them safe. A one-hectare (2.5 acre) island sanctuary costs around $100,000 AUD. We cannot do it without your support.

A drone shot of the first and second hahas from above

We urgently need your support!

Please consider a tax-deductible donation before 30 June and help us to construct more hahas so we can rehabilitate more orangutans and permanently release them back to the wild.

In Australia, all donations over $2 are tax deductible. With the end of financial year upon us, there is no better time to donate!

Please make a tax-deductible donation today!

We are so grateful for any support you can give. Our work to protect orangutans is as critical as ever and we can’t do it without you!

With sincere thanks from the OFI Australia team.