Blogs from Sepilok Orang Utan Sanctuary, Sabah, Malaysia, Asia - page 8

Well the final part of the placement has come to an end and what a fantastic way to end by time at Sepilok by working in the Outdoor Nursery with the older (but not necessarily wiser!) Orangutans. The Orangs are free to come and go but usually their stomachs rule and they turn up for feeding time or for the cheeky ones just before so they can try and mug you on route carrying the bananas to the feeding platform. We would lose all our bananas if we had not had the Security Guard Protection that came in the form of our rangers either Dusain or Jomius. One malay word by these guys is enough to stop the banana snatch and grab on the volunteers! Now babies in the indoor nursery may be seriously cute and ... read more

Time is just flying and it has again been 9 days since our last days off. For these days off there was a Sepilok arranged event, an overnight stay at Sepilok Laut. Home for the night at Sepilok Laut was the Reserves Reception Centre located in the mangrove region on the edge of Kabili-Sepilok Forest Reserve. But firstly to get there was had a choice we could either take the easy route a car and boat ride or we could trek the 5.5km from Sepilok. Me when ever have I taken the easy route?! As I saw it, it was my chance to do the extended trek that I had wanted to do earlier in the placement but which never happened during our surveys and also probably my last chance to walk through the Sepilok Reserve ... read more

Still catching up with blog entries. Up to the 10th July I have been working on surveying the Small Mammals that inhabit our surroundings at Sepilok. Over 4 day period we laid 20 traps baited with banana. Don't think I really need to say they traps do no harm to the little creatures that are tempted in by the promise of a meal, which is probably worth the indignantly of been caught for a few hours and having vital statistics taken followed by a little hair cut! Over the 4 days we managed to capture several different species mainly shrews either Common Tree Shrew or the Large Tree Shrew variety which always proved very vocal and try to make taking measurement more than a little difficult. Now before you think of the small little shrew ... read more

THE LOVERS OF BANANAS...... Sepilok Orangutan Rehabilitation Center is one of the world's best- known rehabilitation centers for orphaned or abandoned orang utan. The aim of this center has always been to return orphaned, injured or displaced orang utan back into the wild. Young orang utans deprived of their mothers lack the ability to find food, build nests or even climb trees properly. At the rehabilitation center, they spend time learning the skills essential to living in the jungle. Once they are ready, they are moved to an "outdoor nursery" where their dependence on the food and emotional support is gradually decreased while their freedom is increased. Visitors can witness part of this process by twice-daily feedings on platforms a hundred or so feet away. The above information was primarily taken from a brochure I picked ... read more

Well the start the placement at Sepilok has begun. Though we don’t officially start until Monday we have spent the last few days getting some work experience at Sepilok - probably because they realized that the volunteers are just too excited about working with Orangutans to be able to wait until Monday and how correct they are. The talk for the last week has revolved around orange, hairy babies. We started with an Induction by Sylvia and we were model students - listening intently just in case we lost out on the Hands On experience that was going to happen later in the day. A few hours later we split into 2 groups of 6 and headed off in different directions; one group to the Indoor clinic and the second group (my group) to the ... read more