{"id":4085,"date":"2018-08-23T10:00:17","date_gmt":"2018-08-23T14:00:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/canada\/?p=4085"},"modified":"2021-12-06T06:33:40","modified_gmt":"2021-12-06T11:33:40","slug":"10-furry-facts-about-orangutans","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/canada\/en\/story\/4085\/10-furry-facts-about-orangutans\/","title":{"rendered":"10 furry facts about orangutans"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Ever wondered where orangutans sleep? Or where their name comes from? Here are 10 fun facts about orangutans that you can impress your friends with:<\/p>\n

10) Orangutans only live on two islands<\/b>\u00a0\u2013 They can be found on the Southeast Asian islands of Borneo and (northern) Sumatra. 12,000 years ago you could have found them in Southern China, Indochina, Java and southern Sumatra \u2013 the species are now extinct in these regions.<\/p>\n

9) 3 species<\/b>\u00a0\u2013 It was previously thought that there were only 2 species of orangutans: the Borneo orangutan (Pongo pygmaeus) and Sumatra orangutan (Pongo abelii). However, it was only last year that another species was discovered: the Tapanuli orangutan (Pongo tapanuliensis).<\/p>\n

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A female Tapanuli orangutan and her baby in Tapanuli, North Sumatra<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

8) Nailed it<\/b>\u00a0\u2013 About a third of orangutans don\u2019t have a nail on their big toe!<\/p>\n

7) Humans of the forest<\/b>\u00a0\u2013 The word orangutan comes from the Malay language; \u2018orang\u2019 means human and \u2018utan\u2019 is derived from \u2018hutan\u2019 which means forest, so the word orangutan literally means \u2018human of the forest\u2019.<\/p>\n

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6) Big<\/b>\u00a0hugs<\/b>\u00a0\u2013 Orangutans are usually between 1.2m to 1.5m tall but have a longer arm span of up to 2m!<\/p>\n

5) Basically cousins<\/b>\u00a0\u2013 We humans share nearly 97% of the same DNA with orangutans, making them one of our closest relatives after apes.<\/p>\n

4) Riding solo<\/b>\u00a0\u2013 Although we share a lot of the same DNA as orangutans, they aren\u2019t as sociable as us; orangutans spend a lot of time on their own. After mating, the female abandons the male who has no role in caring for the baby orangutans.<\/p>\n

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3) Nest is best<\/b>\u00a0\u2013 Orangutans are arboreal which means they spend most of their lives in trees \u2013 they even sleep in nests in trees. Although Bornean orangutans sometimes spend time on the ground, Sumatran orangutans rarely come down to the forest floor.<\/p>\n

2) 5 a day<\/b>\u00a0\u2013 Orangutans mainly eat fruit and leaves, but they are also known to use twigs as tools to scoop termites out of holes in trees for a snack.<\/p>\n

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1) The orangutan population falls by 25 everyday<\/b>\u00a0\u2013 The rainforests that they call home are being destroyed to make way for palm oil plantations, putting the orangutan population seriously under threat. Palm oil is an ingredient used to make products for brands like Unilever, Mondelez and Nestl\u00e9.<\/p>\n

If we don\u2019t act, more precious habitats will be ruined and the orangutan species could be lost forever.\u00a0Here’s how you can make a difference today:<\/strong><\/p>\n

Watch and share our new video<\/strong>\u00a0about Rang-tan, a baby orangutan in trouble:<\/p>\n

Watch Rang-tan<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\t\t\t\n\t\t\t<\/a>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\n \t\t\t

\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\n\t\t\t\t\t\tTell big companies to drop dirty palm oil\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/a>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t \n Take action\n <\/a>\n \t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/section>\n\t","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Ever wondered where orangutans sleep? Or where their name comes from? Here are 10 fun facts about orangutans that you can impress your friends with<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":3947,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ep_exclude_from_search":false,"p4_og_title":"","p4_og_description":"","p4_og_image":"","p4_og_image_id":"","p4_seo_canonical_url":"","p4_campaign_name":"","p4_local_project":"","p4_basket_name":"","p4_department":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[24,27],"p4-page-type":[16],"class_list":["post-4085","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-nature","tag-consumption","tag-forests","p4-page-type-story"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/canada\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4085","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/canada\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/canada\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/canada\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/canada\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4085"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/canada\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4085\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":51429,"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/canada\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4085\/revisions\/51429"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/canada\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3947"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/canada\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4085"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/canada\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4085"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/canada\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4085"},{"taxonomy":"p4-page-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.greenpeace.org\/canada\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/p4-page-type?post=4085"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}