Chicago Zoological Society

Dedicated conservationists will go to great lengths to protect wild orangutans. Asril, quarantine director for the Sumatran Orangutan Conservation Program, is a case in point. This fall, he traveled from his home in northern Sumatra in Indonesia to the other side of the globe—Brookfield Zoo—in order to help the endangered species.

Asril (who goes by a single name, like Bono and Ronaldo) spent his first few days at the zoo serving as a key presenter at the groundbreaking Orangutan SSP (Species Survival Plan) Husbandry Workshop, hosted by Chicago Zoological Society in October. The workshop marked the first time that zookeepers, field researchers, and sanctuary caretakers came together to share information on the animals’ needs and to discuss steps to further protect the endangered apes. 
 

Back to the Wild
As any new parent can tell you, taking care of an infant is a round-the-clock full-time job. Asril frequently stays up all night feeding and comforting the youngest of his orangutan charges – much in the same way their mothers would. “Sometimes I can’t sleep more than ten minutes,” he said.

Asril, quarantine director for the Sumatran Orangutan Conservation Program, is used to missing some sleep now and then. He approaches saving orangutans from extinction as a hands-on, round-the-clock job. Asril rehabilitates orangutans who are, for one reason or another, incapable of surviving in the wild. There are currently 15 orangutans in the quarantine center he directs – and over 100 who have made their way through the rehabilitation program and have successfully returned to the wild.

Rehabilitation is an expansive term when it comes to orangutans in sanctuaries. Some animals have tuberculosis or other diseases and need treatment and a safe place to recover. Others have been rescued from homes where they were illegally kept as pets. As a result, they lack the basic skills they need to fend for themselves in their natural habitat. There are also infants or young juveniles who have lost their mothers.

Asril is looking forward to using the new behavioral husbandry techniques he learned during the two weeks he worked with orangutan keepers at Brookfield Zoo. Many of the orangutans under his care stay in quarantine for months – some as long as a year. As a result, their needs while in quarantine are similar to those of orangutans living in zoos.

The techniques he learned will allow him to provide better and less-disruptive medical care to those orangutans quarantined due to illness. Asril will now be able to train his patients to cooperate with medical examinations and procedures, such as blood sampling and sonograms. With the proper conditioning, orangutans can learn to participate in their own routine medical care. For example, orangutans can be conditioned to present their shoulder for injections.

Asril is also better prepared to provide his charges with opportunities to exercise the behaviors they would normally exhibit in the wild—promoting their health by keeping them active and engaged with their environment. And he has new tools to help him teach the basic skills of climbing and finding food that are essential to survival in the wild.

While Asril’s training at Brookfield Zoo cannot put more hours in the day, it is letting him make better use of the time he has – so he can provide more and higher-quality care to the orangutans he protects. And with a species in danger of extinction, every bit of care helps.

Behavioral husbandry techniques encourage orangutans to participate in their own care while providing them with a more stimulating and engaging environment.

The gathered experts issued a range of recommendations to be implemented in the coming months and years. CZS wasted no time carrying out one important action step: providing caretakers from Indonesian and Malaysian orangutan sanctuaries with expert training in orangutan husbandry at North American zoos.

While the workshop was still in its planning stages, CZS issued an extended invitation to Asril, asking him to stay after the workshop in order to work with TropicWorld/Asia Lead Keeper, Carol Sodaro and other orangutan keepers at the zoo.

Asril is an expert in providing urgent hands-on care to orangutans in crisis. At the workshop, he shared his experiences directing a quarantine facility that now sadly shelters numerous wild animals every year. For many of the orangutans he works with, rehabilitation is a lengthy process, requiring months if not years of care. So Asril came to Brookfield Zoo with a particular interest in behavioral husbandry techniques employed by Sodaro and other CZS keepers to enhance the long-term care of orangutans.

These techniques include conditioning programs that encourage orangutans to participate in their own care while providing them with a more stimulating and engaging environment. Behavioral husbandry techniques can potentially enhance the quality of care provided not only by Asril, but by other orangutan sanctuary workers in Indonesia and Malaysia.

The zoo environment is an ideal training environment because it allows sanctuary workers to watch keepers in action. “Many times the keepers from America want to go help wild orangutans in Indonesia or Malaysia,” said Sodaro. “However, due to the language barrier and other logistics, it’s much more productive if sanctuary workers come to work here.”

Sodaro and the staff of Tropic World have a lot of knowledge to share. When it comes to orangutan husbandry, they literally wrote the book. They recently reworked the husbandry manual used in all AZA orangutan facilities. With so much knowledge available, Asril had to focus his training.

In the two weeks that he worked closely with Tropic World Staff and the zoo’s eight orangutans, Asril concentrated on learning techniques that would improve the level of care he provides to long-term occupants of his quarantine facility, allowing him to provide medical care more easily, for example, or to create opportunities for orangutans to engage in behaviors they exhibit in the wild.

Asril is only the first of many orangutan sanctuary workers that CZS would like to invite to Brookfield Zoo for in-depth training. This is one of the many ways that CZS is promoting species well-being around the world. In addition to caring for the orangutans at the zoo, CZS is reaching out to help the wild orangutan populations in Indonesia and Malaysia.

This training program makes wise use of one of CZS’s most valuable resource – knowledge and experience in animal husbandry, welfare and conservation. For every sanctuary worker trained in behavioral husbandry techniques, there are hundreds of orangutans whose lives will be improved, if not saved.