Aspinall Foundation Deliver Primates Back to Homeland
Keepers at the Aspinall Foundation’s Port Lympne Park bid a tearful farewell to a group of Javan langurs and a Javan gibbon as they headed on a 72 hour journey back into the wild. The seven primates have been carefully placed into travel crates to head back to what would have originally been their home in Java, Indonesia.
This is part of the Aspinall Foundation’s amazing ‘Java Primate Project’, which sees these beautiful creature reintroduced to the forests of Java to begin their new lives in the wild. The project has been running for 8 years now, with staff both in the UK and in Indonesia who are on hand to liaise with the local governments to ensure the primates are released into a suitable area of forest.
Aspinall Foundation Animal Manager, Simon Jeffrey, said –
Everything went very smoothly on the day – the primates are healthy and happy and are ready for their great adventure in Java. I’m delighted to see this finally happening as there have been a few setbacks along the way – but now, here we are, sending our first group of captive born langurs and gibbon back to the wild where they belong. I’d like to thank all the KM Group readers who supported our Back To The Wild appeal and helped us to raise the money to make this move possible.
The Aspinall Foundation opened their West Java Centre in 2012 to help primates back into the surrounding forests. This centre is already home to 13 gibbons who have been confiscated from locals who were using them as pets, and they are now being treated and prepared to be reintroduced back into the wild along with the new arrivals from the Port Lympne Park in Kent.
These animals are now being cared for by the Aspinall Foundation’s Indonesian team, who are helping the primates to readjust to the climate and the new environment. After all, the temperatures in Java are slightly different to Kent in February! Here’s wishing them the best of luck in their new home, and hopefully their reintroduction into the forests of Indonesia will see an upsurge in the number of these beautiful animals in the future.
If you would like to help the Aspinall Foundation to reintroduce endangered species back into the wild, why not adopt an animal through our dedicated charity page? Here you can find out more about their amazing work both at home and abroad, and how you can help to raise funds to support their groundbreaking animal initiatives.