ADELAIDE Zoo yesterday hastily dropped plans to photograph ginger-haired people to promote the plight of orangutans, after patrons saw red.
"We seem to be getting quite a bit of a negative reaction to that request," Zoos SA's director of conservation programs, Kevin Evans, said.
"People are possibly more sensitive about it than we thought."
Last week, advertisements ran offering "free Zoo entry for all rangas" during the school holidays.
"Ranga" – an abbreviation of orangutan – is a common nickname for redheads.
"We have a campaign over the school holidays because of orangutans being an endangered species – and so are human redheads," Mr Evans said. Less than 2 per cent of the human race has red hair.
"Because of the way people move around these days, the genes that carry redheads are breeding out to brunettes and blondes," Mr Evans said.
"Eventually it looks like they are going to be extinct, as well."
The Zoo will continue to offer free entry to people with red hair for the next two weeks, to raise awareness about orangutans being endangered in the wild.
The campaign is timed to coincide with the birthday of the Zoo's male orangutan, Pusung, and will include daily talks about the species.
Dyed red hair will qualify for free entry and zoo staff will not seek proof that patrons are natural redheads.
"We're not actually checking tops and tails, or anything like that," Mr Evans said.
