On my journey to photograph Orangutans I ended up in Tanjung Puting national park in Borneo.The park has a lot of wildlife including both wild orangutans and also orangutans who have been released back into the wild after being rescued from illegal pet trade and then hand reared in captivity.The use of palm oil in so many products worldwide has put massive pressure on the homes of these intelligent animals.

Often I would wake to the haunting sound of howling gibbons early in the morning, raise the blind on the side of my houseboat and see as many as 10 different orangutans in various trees in the area close to camp Leakey where the ranger camp was.The rangers brought food out to a feeding station in the forest where any orangutan that needed some help could come for a meal.

It was fascinating to see the intelligence shown by the orangutans, they learnt so quickly from observing their human neighbours.There was one orangutan who often “borrowed” the rangers canoe and used it to paddle across the nearby river, I also observed orangutans rubbing soap and water on their bodies to make bubbles and even a mother and juvenile that found some clothes outside one of the rangers huts put the clothes on , even the wellington gum boots!