Unique mixed species exhibit

[Jileha]

San Diego Zoo has orangutans together with siamangs. One juvenile orangutan recently “adopted” a siamang baby and they peacefully play together. The female orangutan is very protective of the little siamang and makes sure it doesn’t get into trouble. Initially, the parents were not too happy about that, but they came to realize that the baby is in good hands. I haven’t seen the two species interact with each other before.

In captivity, it’s not that rare that two animals of different species develop a close friendship. But that doesn’t necessarily mean that the two species per se will always get along. Like one cat playing with her best buddy - a mouse, while another cat would be salivating at the sight of a meal.

 

[NZFanatic]

San Diego Zoo has orangutans together with siamangs. One juvenile orangutan recently “adopted” a siamang baby and they peacefully play together. The female orangutan is very protective of the little siamang and makes sure it doesn’t get into trouble. Initially, the parents were not too happy about that, but they came to realize that the baby is in good hands. I haven’t seen the two species interact with each other before.

In captivity, it’s not that rare that two animals of different species develop a close friendship. But that doesn’t necessarily mean that the two species per se will always get along. Like one cat playing with her best buddy - a mouse, while another cat would be salivating at the sight of a meal.

Indeed, the orangutan/siamang mix is another I mentioned earlier that has seen some success (I think either Melbourne Zoo or Taronga Zoo in Sydney did it as well).

As to the rest, absolutely right. A friend of mine keeps pet rats and also has a dog. At first the dog and rats were perfect together. All four of her rats could climb on the dog, the dog didn't mind, the rats weren't scared. Then one day, for seemingly no reason, the dog chased one of the rats rather violently, pinned it and crushed it. The dog didn't eat the rat, but the rat died. She ended up giving up the other two because she couldn't bare for it to happen again. Another friend had a cat that got along fine with his birds (budgies). Neither bothered the other. Then the cat one day pounced at the cage, one of the budgies died of shock right away, and another flipped out so badly it broke a wing.

Point is, you never know. In both these cases you're looking at a predator/prey relationship, and it's of course only anecdotal evidence, but even so, you always have to measure the risk against the reward.