Orangutans aren’t only threatened by palm oil plantations, it seems. In this photo a 14-year-old male orang gets some veterinary attention by staff at the Sumatran Orangutan Conservation Programme because he was shot with metal pellets from an air gun. Meanwhile, he gives the photographer his best honey badger face.
The orangutan was rescued by Indonesia’s ministry of forestry personnel and Orangutan Information Center on April 15, 2014 in nearby Langkat district in a small patch of forest and agricultural plantation. The center has cared for over 280 orangutans rescued from palm oil plantations, poachers and pet owners and over 200 have been reintroduced in the wilds. The critically-endangered primates population are dwindling rapidly due to poaching and rapid destruction of their forest habitat that is being converted into palm oil plantation.
