Intelligent
and fascinating apes.
The orangutans are two
species of great apes known for their intelligence, long
arms and reddish-brown hair. Native to Indonesia and Malaysia,
they are currently found only in rainforests on the islands
of Borneo and Sumatra, though fossils have been found
in Java, Vietnam and China. They are the only surviving
species in the genus Pongo and the subfamily Ponginae
(which also includes the extinct genera Gigantopithecus
and Sivapithecus). Their name derives from the Malay and
Indonesian phrase orang hutan, meaning "person of
the forest".
Like the other great apes, orangutans are remarkably intelligent.
Although tool use among chimpanzees was documented by
Jane Goodall in the 1960s, it was not until the mid-1990s
that one population of orangutans was found to use feeding
tools regularly. A 2003 paper in the journal Science described
the evidence for distinct orangutan cultures... |
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