ST. PETERSBURG, Fla. — What's cuter than orangutans or otters? Orangutans AND otters!
In these adorable photos from Pairi Daiza, a zoo located in Brugelette, Belgium, you can see the two families getting to know one another, and it's absolutely adorable.
The zoo says the otter-orangutan enclosure is home to an orangutan family of three -- 24-year-old "dad" Ujian, 15-year-old "mom" Sari, and their 4-year-old son, Berani.
The Asian small-clawed otter family lives in the river that runs through the orangutan territory, what the zoo calls its "Indonesian Flower Temple."
The two families sharing the habitat is by design; having the two species together allows them to interact as part of an "enrichment" program for the orangutans. In addition to having the two families cohabitate, keepers "entertain [the orangutans] all day long with mind games, riddles, puzzles, and other stuff to train their intelligence."
"The otters really enjoy getting out of the water on the orangutan island to go and play with their big, furry friends," Mathieu Goedefroy, spokesman for Pairi Daiza said.
Goedefroy added that Ujian and Berani have "developed a very special bond with their neighbors."
Ujian, Sari and Berani arrived at the zoo in 2017 when they moved from the German zoo of Heidelberg into their new habitat. The zoo also has another orangutan family that includes one male and one female: Gempa and Sinta.
The zoo says orangutans are "extremely threatened" in the wild, due to palm oil exploitation of the forests they live in Borneo and Sumatra. Goedefroy says the zoo has raised funds to plant 11,000 trees in the region to help orangutans who live in the wild.
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