READER ADVISORY: This story contains images of dead animals that some viewers may find disturbing. LODJA, Democratic Republic of Congo — Disaster struck Héritier Mpo’s tiny NGO in the central…
Chimpanzees tend to sleep more on the ground than previously thought, a behavior that has implications for their conservation and could help explain how and when early humans abandoned trees…
JAKARTA — When scientists made the bombshell announcement in 2017 that the Tapanuli orangutan (Pongo tapanuliensis) was a new species, the apes were immediately put under the global spotlight. With…
In 2017, the Tapanuli orangutan was identified as a new species of great ape — and immediately became the most endangered great ape on the planet, with a total population…
A team of international scientists has used a new genetic tool to measure the size of a population of crab-fishing chimpanzees living in a pristine mountain range in Guinea where…
Gorillas and chimpanzees, like humans, have long been known to get infected with malaria. But evidence of the parasite's effects on bonobos, one of humankind's closest genetic relatives, has been…
MEDAN, Indonesia — An investigation into the violent death of an orangutan in northern Sumatra in January has shone a light on the persistent problem of human-wildlife conflict and illegal…
BATANG TORU, Indonesia — With fewer than 800 individuals remaining in the wild today, the critically endangered Tapanuli orangutan isn’t just the most threatened great ape species in the world…
JAKARTA — Indonesian academics have called out the government for banning five foreign scientists after they questioned official claims of an increase in the country’s orangutan population, warning that the…
Orangutans, like most of the world’s great apes, are struggling. Their numbers continue to drop as their habitat disappears, or they’re killed by humans for food, out of fear or…
JAKARTA — “Remarkably lax” and “laissez-faire” law enforcement efforts by conservation authorities in Indonesia have allowed the killing, capture and trade of scores of orangutans to persist, according to a…
Mountain gorillas are currently the only nonhuman great ape whose population is not declining. Thanks to successful conservation interventions, the species' population has increased from 620 in 1989 to more…
Rahayu, a juvenile female orangutan, arrived at a rehabilitation center on the Indonesian part of Borneo island feverish, unresponsive and almost comatose, recounts Karmele Llano Sanchez, program director at International…
Gorillas and chimpanzees living in a remote part of the Congo Basin hang out together and some, like humans, even establish “relationships with benefits,” a new study reveals. Observations of…
Bonobos, sometimes referred to as the "hippies" of the ape kingdom, have long been known for their relatively peaceful relations within core family groups. But there’s been less consensus about…
BANGKOK — A run-down department store tucked among Bangkok’s skyscrapers is home to the rooftop Pata Zoo, where nearly 300 animals pace in cages littered with feces, food scraps and…
Dutch biologist Erik Meijaard isn’t afraid to ruffle feathers. In the past 15 years, he’s published some 120 opinion pieces in Indonesian newspapers, many of them critical about the state…
Gunshots, grassland and a tiny population of critically endangered gorillas coexisting with nearby human populations in southwestern Cameroon: a new study analyzes a complex set of factors to help understand…
There are moments in researchers’ lives when they realize the significance of something they hadn’t paid much thought to in the past. For primatologist Catherine Hobaiter and her team, one…
JAKARTA — Habitat for up to a quarter of the known population of Bornean orangutans will disappear across the island of Borneo under predicted patterns of deforestation over the next…
In 2005, a chimpanzee named Tico arrived at a rescue center in Spain. The details of his early life were vague: he'd been found roaming in the mountains before being…
Conservationists feared that chimpanzees in Comoé National Park might have been wiped out during a decade of civil conflict in Côte d'Ivoire. But camera-trap footage found a healthy population and…
This March, the NGO Friends of Bonobos released 14 bonobos into the wild — only the second time ever a bonobo group has been reintroduced to their natural habitat. Their…
Over the past 20 years, more than $1 billion has been spent on orangutan conservation. Yet all three species of orangutan are currently classified as critically endangered and continue to…
Early February 1989. A blue helicopter, partly tinted in green and white, emerged from the clouds of Kanyang, in Nigeria's Cross River state. Gabriel Osanja, then 22, stood among the…
MEDAN, Indonesia — A politician arrested on charges of bribery last month in Indonesia’s North Sumatra province was also found to be keeping several rare animals as as illegal pets,…
KAMPALA, Uganda — Tour guide Patrick Kataama relied heavily on income from leading gorilla-trekking tours in Uganda's national parks. These tours were abruptly shut down in late March 2020, after…
BALI, Indonesia — Satellite imagery has detected deforestation in a gold mining concession in Indonesia that overlaps with the habitat of the most threatened great ape in the world. U.S.-based…
MBE MOUNTAINS, Nigeria — Three hop-like steps and a leap, and suddenly Jacob Osang, an eco-guard with the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS), appears to be levitating above the rainforest floor.…
JAKARTA — Protecting all remaining orangutans and their forest habitat in Indonesia will provide a bastion for the survival of Asia’s only great ape, wildlife experts say in a new…
