Bridging the gap: how humans and orangutans can peacefully co-exist in the rainforest!
The rainforests of Sumatra are home to a whole host of amazing wild animals, such as the majestic (and goofy!) orangutan.
Forest loss in this part of Asia can be for a number of reasons, for example to make use of the land for building new tarmac roads or as a result of palm oil plantations. For the people who live close to the forests, new roads can help them with their everyday and essential journeys. For us in Wales and many countries around the world, the palm oil grown in tropical climates is a useful oil used in many foods and everyday products.
If you are an orangutan living in the canopy, both of these can spell danger… big roads and plantations can fragment the rainforest habitat, making it difficult for forest animals to cross from one part of the forest to another. The orangutan populations can get separated, and when they want to breed they will find it difficult to cross to the other side. This endangers them and could lead to them disappearing from the forest.
Learn more in this video
Throwing nature a rope line!
We are super proud to introduce our readers to our forest partners – the Sumatran Orangutan Society and TaHuKah – who work to protect rainforests in Sumatra, Indonesia, South East Asia. Working with these caring and hard-working groups of people we can tackle the problem of new roads and fractured habitats by building rope bridges in the tree canopy that connect the forest on both sides of the road.
Up until 2026, small monkeys were the first pioneers to brave the bridge, being the first to explore and show off their tight-rope walking skills! Everyone hoped that the curious orangutans would see the smaller monkeys successfully making the crossing, giving them the confidence to give it a go. Being able to cross from one side of the rainforest to the other will be essential in the survival of the orangutan as a species.
Braving the bridge...
After two years of waiting: with nothing but one hairy orange visitor playing peekaboo with the camera, finally it happened! In Spring of 2026 an orangutan was captured on a hidden camera crossing the bridge- and he was not at all camera shy! Take a look at this wonderful footage of this young male orangutan cautiously making the high crossing across the rope bridge above the road. He even stops half way, seemingly to take in the breathtaking view of his rainforest home in West Toba.
This milestone is a huge boost for conservation, as this is the first time a Sumatran orangutan has ever been recorded using an artificial canopy bridge to cross a public road – a powerful sign that these bridges are helping reconnect the fragmented forest and helping the orangutans to move through the landscape.
Watch the video here
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