Ouwens became curator of the Zoological Museum in Buitenzorg. (Buitenzorg is now called Bogor). Lieutenant Jacques Karel Henri van Steyn van Hensbroek was the first Westerner to see Komodo dragons. Hensbroek sent a photo and a skin of a Komodo dragon to Ouwens. He then sent a collector to Komodo who returned to Java with two adults and a young lizard. Ouwens named the species "Varanus komodoensis" in a publication of 1912. Ouwens became Officer of the Order of Orange-Nassau and died in Buitenzorg in 1922.