 Click To Enlarge A sloth has tiny ears and doesn't hear very well. But it has great eyesight, a good sense of smell, and is sensitive to vibrations. |
SLOTHS Perhaps my favorite animal found the rainforest is the sloth. Costa Rica is home to two of the five species of sloth, the two-toed (Chollepus hoffmanni) and three-toed sloth (Bradypus variegatus). The sloth is the slowest mammal on Earth. It takes a month for a sloth to move 1 kilometer! Sloths are arboreal animals, which means that they spend most of their lives hanging upside-down from tree branches. They eat, sleep, mate, and give birth upside-down in the trees. They hold onto tree branches with strong, curved claws that are on each of their four feet |
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Sloths are herbivores. They eat leaves, tender young trees, and fruit. But it's hard to find time to eat during the sloth's busy schedule that includes sleeping about 15-18 hours each day. The main difference between the two-toed and three-toed sloths (besides the number of toes) is that the three-toed sloth is diurnal and the two-toed sloth is nocturnal. Both of the animals are about 1.5 - 2 feet in length. Both species have a stumpy tail. Everything a sloth does is slow. It chews slowly, blinks its eyes slowly, and definitely moves slowly. Sloths have a low metabolic rate and a low body temperature (91°F). This allows them to eat very slowly (and only need a little bit of food), and they don't require much water, because they don't expend much energy. It takes nearly a week for a sloth to digest one meal. Sloths are related to anteaters, a group of mammals known as edentates. Anteaters and other edentates don't have teeth. However, sloths have small teeth which they use to chew up their leafy food. |
 Click To Enlarge Some sloths can rotate the head 270 degrees. This is because they have more neck vertebrae than most mammals (only 7). |
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A sloth can tolerate larger changes in body temperature than any other mammal: from 74°F - 92°F. At night, its body temperature can drop by as much as 22°F to conserve energy. Its thick hairy coat helps conserve heat and it sleeps in a tight ball to stay warm. A sloth has very little muscle: it has the lowest muscle to mass ratios of all mammals. So it cannot shiver to keep warm. Three-toed sloths warm up by basking in the sun (in a more open tree) but Two-toed sloths don't appear to do this. Sloths are hunted by jaguars, harpy eagles, and people. A sloth's main forms of protection are its camouflage (greatly increased by the coating of algae growing on its fur) and its very slow movement; these adaptations make it virtually disappear in the rain forest canopy. The sloth got its name from its slow movement. It is not lazy, just slow-moving. |
 Click To Enlarge Sloths love hanging around. |
 Click To Enlarge Three-toed sloths are diurnal, and toe-toed sloths are nocturnal. Which species is this one? |