Sad day in Primate World

Sometime early this morning our orangutan Sandra passed away. For those of you not keeping track of the orangutan saga, she's the one who adopted the baby (Mahal) about 2 1/2 weeks ago. She was very old (born in 1956), and with Mahal in her life, was much more active. It's possible that caring for him shortened her life a little, but it also greatly enriched it. We are confident that she died happy and with a purpose to her life. Now of course that left Mahal without a mommy yet again. We had introduced Hadiah to the 2 of them 6 days ago, so she'd been in with them during the day. We put her in with Mahal today. He was remarkably calm, but not too keen on hanging close to her. He actually seems to be dominant over her, threatening her if she got too close. He did apparently follow her some and she was close during feedings to get treats. They were left together overnight, and we're hopeful that within a few days they may bond.
Here's a picture of Mahal and Sandra that I took last week:


I'll keep you posted how things go!