An ape of Borneo’s tropical forests. It moves through trees using long arms and grasping hands and feet.
It eats many fruits, along with leaves and shoots, and rests in nests built from vegetation in trees.
Bornean orangutans build tree nests from branches and leaves. Forests supply not only fruit but also resting places. In a peat-swamp forest, researchers compared nest trees with nearby trees, examining crown foliage and root structures as well as tree height.
In the peat-swamp forest of northern Sabangau, Central Kalimantan, researchers examined 120 single-tree nests among 180 recorded nest trees during July–September 2008. Compared with 150 surrounding control trees, nest trees more often had dense canopy cover and buttress or stilt roots. Mean nest-tree height was 15.1 m.
Young are carried and nursed by their mothers. Nest trees and fruiting trees form part of the same forest used by mother and young.
An extinction-risk assessment has not been added yet.
Forest loss and fragmentation disrupt movement between fruiting trees. Capture for meat and the illegal pet trade also threatens Bornean orangutans.