May
08
Cheyenne Reaches a Milestone on Mother’s Day
By - May 08, 2012
Posted in Conservation,Primates,Wortham World of Primates

May 13 is a special day for mothers everywhere, and orangutan Cheyenne is no exception. In addition to celebrating Mother’s Day with her latest adopted infant, Aurora, she turns 40 on the very same day. Many people express surprise that all the great apes have such a long lifespan. Cheyenne’s own mother lived to be 52 at the Cheyenne Mountain Zoo  and all gorillas, chimpanzees, bonobos and orangutans have the capacity to live into their fifties and even their sixties.

As we honor Mother’s Day and our newest orangutan family, awareness of what wild orangutans in Borneo and Sumatra are facing is ever-present. Baby Aurora has found a loving mother here, and yet babies in the forests are routinely losing theirs, as mother orangutans all over these islands are in the midst of the biggest crisis the species has ever faced.  As consumers all over the world buy food, cosmetics and lotions containing palm oil, the forests in Indonesia and Malaysia are being cut, burned and drained to create more palm oil plantations.  Orangutans are being killed by fire, gunshots and machetes to quench the world’s infinite appetite for palm oil, and that includes mothers with tiny, clinging infants. Crying babies are pried off their deceased mothers; the luckier ones are sometimes rescued and sent to rehabilitation facilities, where they are cared for by humans in the company of hundreds of other orphaned youngsters. The unluckier ones are kept as pets, where they die of malnutrition or remain chained to a backyard post, where they languish in misery for years.

The Houston Zoo is fortunate to have an orangutan like Cheyenne, whose great role in life is to adopt and love babies not genetically her own.  But, we must be mindful of those missing orangutan mothers  in the wild, who like her, are just trying to make sure that their babies stay safe and healthy. They are fighting a war that they cannot win unless the world listens to their plight. Are we willing to sacrifice the lives of one of our closest living relatives for  …  palm oil?

 

This Mother’s Day, ponder that question, and know that all of us have a part in being responsible consumers. We can help, with “the power of the purse.” Everything we buy is like a vote, and we can vote for orangutan mothers and their babies to survive by choosing our products carefully.

 

 

 

 

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