19th August Orangutan Day

With their expressive faces and personalities, and their close genetic relationship to humans — with about 96% identical genes — orangutans captivate us. The children who use the library are always keen to learn more about them. 

Even older books like Mang by Joan van Loon, Little Tang  by Sally Grindley and Imagine You're an Orangutan by Karen Wallace are still borrowed.

Orangutans are great apes that are only found now in Borneo and Sumatra. They are the most aboreal of all the great apes which means that they spend most of their life in trees. They have proportionally long arms and short legs, and have reddish-brown hair covering their bodies.

Orangutans are among the most intelligent primates. They use sophisticated tools and  construct elaborate sleeping nests each night from branches and foliage. 

• Orangutans Build Nests in Trees  by Elizabeth Raum

• Orangutan Hats and Other Tools Animals Use  by Richard Haynes

All three orangutan species are considered critically endangered. The apes' learning abilities have been studied extensively. 

• The Emerald Forest  by Catherine Ward and Karin Littlewood is a new book that is set in tropical Sumatra, an island that has lost almost half of its rainforest cover in recent years. The story graphically describes the reactions of an orangutan family to the destruction of their age-old home, but also shows how wildlife campaigners are bringing hope for the future.

• Saving Urangutans  by Carla Litchfield

• Orangutan Houdini  by Laurel Neme

This is the true story of Fu Manchu, an adult male orangutan, who relishes outsmarting his friend, zookeeper Jerry Stones. He does just that when he escapes his enclosure at will and spends sunny days with the elephants in another part of the zoo. Jerry soon discovers that Fu can open the locked door, but can't figure out how he does it. Read it to find out how.

Of course there's some stories to share as well:

If you can find Pongo  by Jesse Hodgson in your library you are in for a treat. The illustrations are beautiful!

19th September International Red Panda Day

I have written about this day before here and here, but given the news a couple of weeks ago I thought I would revisit it. Ravi, a red panda at Taronga Zoo, near where I teach and where the students who are Zoo Friends, often go, even for afternoon tea and a stroll before going home was sent to Adelaide Zoo in the hope of mating with a female red panda there. Two days after he arrived, he escaped. See these news articles here and here and filmclip. It makes for a good story to share with a class and an excuse to read more about them. This tale had a good ending. Earlier in the year a red panda escaped from Symbio Wildlife Park on the outskirts of Sydney and the outcome for this red panda was not good news. With an older class of students who have read these news articles, it would make a good debate topic about whether or not red pandas should be kept in captivity.

As well as what we already had, the library now has a new book in the Zoe's Rescue Zoo series, The Rowdy Red Panda which features a very naughty red panda. Perhaps just like Ravi. 

See other post for suggested reading. If you can find Pip and the Bamboo Path by Jesse Hodgson, it is a beautiful book from Flying Eye Books.

19th September International Red Panda Day

Red pandas are not as popular as giant pandas in children's books, but they still manage to find their way into endearing stories and are worth celebrating on their special day, the third Saturday of  September annually.

Unlike the name and the diet of bamboo implies, red pandas are not related to giant pandas and were discovered fifty years earlier.

If you want a brief, but useful informative text about red pandas for young students and you do not have one in your school library this is a good start. And this on Kiddle. 

In our library we have:

• Red Pandas by Laura Marsh

• Red Pandas by Victoria Blakemore

Picture book stories that feature red pandas

• Pip and the Bamboo Path  by Jesse Hodgson

• Red Panda's Toffee Apples by Ruth Paul

• Hedgehog's Magic Tricks by Ruth Paul

• Rabbit's Hide-and-Seek by Ruth Paul

• Amy the Red Panda is Writing the Best Story in the World by Colleen Venable & Ruth Chan

Look out for Baby Red Pandas by Kate Riggs, one book in a new series for very young readers by a publisher who really knows how to do young nonfiction with spectacular photographs.