Herald-Advocate Thursday, November 28, 2019THE

By JENNIFER McCONKEYOf The Herald-Advocate

After 11 years alone, sep-arated from any of herspecies and locked in a smallzoo, orangutan Sandra hascome to Wauchula to live atthe Center for Great Apes.

“She’ll have choiceshere,” says Patti Ragan,founder of the center.

Sandra’s move has been inthe international spotlight,since Sandra was grantedlegal personhood status inArgentina.

The judge in that case,Elena Liberatori, ruled thatSandra has the right to re-spect, quality care andchoices, Ragan explains.

Liberatori said that Sandrawould go to a sanctuary, nota zoo, Ragan adds, which iswhy she came to CGA, theonly sanctuary for orang-utans in the Americas that isaccredited.

Although Sandra lost herpersonhood status when sheleft Argentina, Ragan saysthat all of the ape residents atCGA are treated with person-hood rights.

“They’re not objects,they’re not chairs,” Ragansays. “They have rights.”

The Right To Respect &Quality Care

Despite requests frommultiple media groups, suchas BBC, ABC, NBC and FoxNews, news crews have notbeen allowed to come filmSandra at her new home yet.

“We’ve had over 40 mediarequests from around theworld to film her arrival andphotos of her here,” Ragansaid. “But we’re waiting untilshe is settled in safely and allgoes well.”

The goal is to give Sandraa life similar to how it wouldbe in the wild.

“They really have the rightto be free in their own envi-ronment,” Ragan says ofgreat apes.

When that’s not possible,she adds, they have the rightto be treated with compas-sion.

Ragan says that two ofSandra’s caregivers from Ar-gentina came for a week tovisit her.

“It was wonderful andthey were really helpful,” shesays.

Settling in at CGA was thesecond major change ofscenery Sandra had to getused to in the past few weeks– before coming toWauchula, she had to bequarantined in Kansas at oneof the few zoos in the U.S.approved for that task by theCenters for Disease Controland Prevention.

“She will spend her lifehere,” Ragan says.

The Right To ChoicesOne of the big choices

Sandra will be allowed tomake at CGA is if and whenshe wants an orangutan com-panion, and if so, who thatwill be.

“It’s all about hertimetable, not ours,” Ragansays.

For now, other orangutansare allowed to come nearSandra’s environment so shecan get used to seeing them.

“She’s very interested inthem,” Ragan says.

Eventually, Sandra willstart meeting the other orang-utans through a mesh barrierin the tunnels, where they canput their fingers through andtouch each other.

“They may do this forhours,” Ragan explains.

If they hit it off, the twowill likely start passing itemsthrough the mesh or playingtogether. If that happens, thetwo will be moved insidewhere they can interact butstill be separated easily.

And if all of that goeswell, the pair will be allowedto go into one of the domehabitats together.

Ragan says CGA plans tointroduce Sandra to Jethrofirst, since he is more shy andquiet, but she emphasizesthat it will be the orangutans’decision if they want to be-friend each other.

Sandra will also have theopportunity to choose a fe-male companion if shewants, although Ragan saysshe’s been especially lookingat the males near her habitat.

Even though orangutanstypically live alone or inpairs, it’s also possible thatSandra could have both amale and female companionif all of the apes want that.

In the meantime, Sandrahas also been allowed tomake choices about whereshe sleeps and what she doesfor fun.

Ragan says Sandra likesforaging and making bignests in the top of her dome,where she can see a long wayaround.

The dome is higher thanshe could go in the Argentin-ian zoo and probably higherthan she could go in Ger-many, where she was born,Ragan says.

On warmer nights, Sandrahas been sleeping outside,but when it’s cooler, shesleeps inside, Ragan says.

“They have the choices ofwhere they want to sleep un-less there’s a hurricane or un-less it’s critically cold,”Ragan says of the ape resi-dents.

Raising AwarenessWhile giving Sandra the

space to settle in without

being surrounded by cameraswas a priority, Ragan hopesthat all of the attention willlead to positive change.

She explains that Sandra isa representative for otherapes in the wild that arebeing killed every week.

“And I think it’s bringinga lot of awareness toWauchula,” she says.

Two famous photogra-phers have been allowed tocome take pictures of Sandra– Nick Ut, who pho-tographed the famous “Na-palm Girl” during theVietnam War, and Mark Ed-ward Harris.

Ragan says she also plansto let some news crews comeafter the first of the year.

One of the main ways tohelp the endangered orang-utans in the wild is to becareful about palm oil prod-ucts, Ragan says.

Buying products that ei-ther don’t use palm oil or thatuse sustainable palm oilhelps lower the demand forthe type of palm oil harvest-ing that is harming the orang-utans’ natural environment.

To find out which productsuse sustainable palm oil, youcan download an app called“Sustainable Palm Oil Shop-ping” by the CheyenneMountain Zoo.

And if you want to helpCGA, you can visit center-forgreatapes.org to become amember, make a one-timedonation, adopt an ape, viewCGA’s wishlist and more.

You can also choose CGAon AmazonSmile so that aportion of your qualifyingAmazon purchases go to thenonprofit.

Patti Ragan says that Sandra loves water and cleaning things, even scrubbing the logs in her environment.

COURTESY PHOTOS

Orangutan Sandra