13 Pictures of Beautiful, Endangered Orangutans
For International Orangutan Day, we celebrate the red-haired great apes with lively and vibrant photos from our archive.
According to the World Wildlife Fund, Bornean orangutans in the wild number around 54,000, while Sumatran orangutans only number around 7,300.
To celebrate these animals’ beauty and improve conservation efforts, a group of nonprofits founded International Orangutan Day on August 19. The great apes’ primary threat is the rapid deforestation of their habitats. With the global demand for palm oil growing exponentially, forests are being slashed and burned to make way for plantations. Without their home, orangutans have a hard time bouncing back, as they only reproduce every six to eight years.
The word “orangutan” comes from the Malay language, meaning “man of the forest.” Keep clicking for 13 photos of orangutans in the wild, in
