Gito was originally discovered by rescuers in 2015, but they weren’t even certain he was still alive.
Little Gito was found curled up in a ball inside a cardboard box covered in his own urine after being abandoned to perish in the sun after his mother was murdered by poachers. He had gray skin, and he had almost no hair left.
His owner had bought him as a pet for $30 — and even though Gito was only a few months old then, he looked as though he were ancient.
“At first we thought he was dead,” International Animal Rescue (IAR) wrote on its website. “He was lying corpse-like with his arms folded across his chest and this, along with a lack of hair and grey flaking skin, made him look almost mummified in his cardboard coffin.”
The newborn monkey was taken to a clinic for veterinary care by the group, and luckily he made it there after a nine-hour motorcycle ride. He started the drawn-out process of getting treated for a variety of conditions brought on by the maltreatment he experienced, including starvation and sarcoptic mange.
However, Gito, who is approximately 3 years old, has almost completely changed from the “mummified orangutan” that he was originally known as.
His skin is now clear, and his hair has become brilliant orange. He effortlessly ascends from tree to tree. He loves fruit and other foods more than everyone else, and most importantly, he is adored.
As a current participant in IAR’s orangutan rehabilitation program, Gito spends his days in a protected forest learning everything there is to know about surviving in the wild among other orphaned orangutans his age.
Since young orangutans spend the first six to seven years of their lives with their mothers, the rescue’s keepers work closely with the young apes to teach them how to climb, how to find food, and how to make nests—important survival skills that their mothers would have taught them at a young age.
According to Lis Key, the rescue’s communications manager, “the juvenile orangutans are routinely observed at the rehabilitation center.” They transition from baby school to forest school to the pre-release island as their confidence and skill levels increase.
Gito will stay at the facility for a number of more years to continue learning about forest life and establishing new companions because he is still in the initial phases of his recovery.
Gito enjoys scaling trees and exploring the forest, Key said. He enjoys playing alone, but he also enjoys playing with his pals. He is picking up new skills quickly; one of his current goals is to master foraging for food in the wild.
Unfortunately, there are many other baby orangutans at the center who have endured abuse or trauma similar to Gito. All three species of orangutan are critically endangered from a blend of habitat destruction and poaching — in Indonesia, people will often steal them from the wild as babies to sell as pets.
When they’re captured, their mothers are usually killed by traffickers so they can’t protect their babies. In other cases, the mothers are killed by locals after getting too close to villages.
“Animals are suffering and dying because of the systematic destruction of the rainforest, primarily for palm oil production,” Key explained. Orangutans who wander onto palm oil plantations have even been shot to keep them away.
But as Gito’s scenario demonstrates, even animals saved from the most desperate circumstances may recover with competent, species-specific care — and a staff that is committed to teaching them the pleasures of life they missed out on in their infancy.
Gito still needs a lot of work, but Key is optimistic that one day he will be ready to return to the wild, where he belongs.
To ascertain whether each individual is prepared for release into the wild, behavioral data is acquired and examined, according to Key. Gito has already started on this voyage, which should eventually take him back into a secure, protected area of woodland where he may carry on living a wild orangutan’s life.
You may donate to International Animal Rescue to help with the rescue and recovery of other orangutans like Gito.
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