It is a story of maternal solidarity between humans and orangutans. At Dublin Zoo, several dozen nursing mothers took turns with their babies to try to teach Mujur, a 19-year-old female orangutan, how to bond with her newborn.
“This is how you should feed him.”
So, midwife and lactation expert Lizzie Reeves selected 30 volunteers: “Mujur already had two babies and they couldn't breastfeed. Unfortunately, both babies died. So when the guards discovered that Mujur was pregnant again, this time, they knew they had to proceed differently!”, she explains to Europe 1 .
In order not to lose the baby orangutan, which is very precious in the eyes of the veterinarians because the orangutan is endangered, they chose a new method. “Most of the mothers took off their t-shirts and bras and showed him, 'OK Mujur, this is the breast, this is what you have to do, if your baby is here, this' is how you have to feed him! Unbelievable!” she says, before explaining why the zoo thought of this new method.
A new kind of learning
“Orangutans are known to mimic human behavior. In fact, they share 97 percent of our DNA! Mujur was really interested, she was very curious, watching the babies through the glass…we really hoped she would learn,” says Lizzie Reeves. .
Mujur gave birth to a healthy male calf on July 31. Unfortunately, despite all these efforts, she did not hold the baby in the right place to nurse, and ultimately had to be bottle-fed, the zoo explains.
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