Primates are not domesticated animals, bred by humans over generations to be companions. They are wild creatures, unfortunate enough to be held captive in unnatural circumstances. However well meaning their human
captors, primates should not be kept as pets. They need the company of their own kind in settings as naturalistic as possible, if they cannot be returned to the wild.
Professor William McGrew
University of Cambridge
Petra Osterberg – Primate Welfare Team
Petra joined the team in 2007 after graduating from Oxford Brookes University with an MSc in Primate Conservation. She carried out fieldwork on the western hoolock gibbon (Hoolock hoolock hoolock) in Bangladesh, where she also discovered a new distribution record for the orange-bellied Himalayan squirrel (Dremomys lokriah). During her time in Bangladesh, Petra helped to arrange a national awareness-raising event for the gibbon, which has subsequently been listed on IUCN Species Survival Commission’s list of the 25 most endangered primates in the world.
Petra has a great interest in animal behaviour and welfare and has experience in the rehabilitation of both domestic and wild animals, gained from over 20 years of work with abused horses as well as from her numerous long-term volunteering experiences to wildlife rescue centres in Asia and South America. Since starting her work at Wild Futures, Petra has become one of the monkeys’ primary caregivers.
