The Sloth

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Sloths

Sloths live for about ten years and they would spend all of that time hanging from brances upside down. They are very shy and they don’t tend to move very fast. Their hair grows the opposite direction than any other animal, because they spend so much time upside down their hair seems to grow away from their bodies. This give them the funny looking appearance they have when you see them upright, they look like they have been slapped in the back of the head really hard and fast. Their fur acts as a camouflage too with the two types of hair it has on its coat it blends in well with the trees.

Their fur is an eco system in itself hosting a range of non parasitic insects that feed off the parasites it may pick up. These non parasitic insects keep the coat in prestege condition. They move very slowly when they do move as to not draw any attention to themselves. They very rarely come to ground, if they do they know the danger and dont stay very long.

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Description

Sloths have flat short heads with big eyes and little ears, they have a stumpy tail no longer than 7cm long. Sloths only line of defense is its claws, and they will swipe at anything that it feels threatened by. Its only predators are the Jaguar, Humans and the Harpy Eagle. They usually grow to a length of 70 cm and use less muscles than any other animal to get around. They can move up to 15 feet a minute if the are thretened, but this is their top speed and they burn up alot of energy doing so.

Sloths are omnivores and they mainly eat leaves, new shoots and buds,  but their diet also consists of fruits, insects and small lizards. The sloths have specially designed stomachs that allows them to digest the toughest of leaves. Their over all body weight is one third sloth and two thirds the contents of its stomach. This is because their stomach takes a month to digest its food. They come down to ground once a week to  urinate and defecate, they do this in the one place for their whole lives. They come down to the ground to do it so as they dont make any noise falling from the trees.

Sloths sleep 10-12 hours a day they do everything upside down, sleep, mate, and eat. They even give birth upside down. When the infant is born the mother hangs upside down and places the infant on her stomach, here is where it will stay until it learns how to use the upside down world of the sloth. Often the infant will fall off and will die not from the fall, but from neglect from the mother that wouldnt take the risk of attending a screaming infant. They are very silent creatures and they know noise draws attention so they wont climb down to help or save the infant. Their top speed on the ground is only 1.5mph and if danger did present itself they wouldn’t stand a chance of getting away.

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Two Toed & Three Toed Sloths

There are six species of sloths remaining in the world and only one of these are on the endangered list, this particular sloth is a ground dweller and is a two toed breed. The difference in the two and three toed sloths is not its toes but its fingers. One type has two fingers on their hands instead of three. The two toed sloths tend to move faster than the three toed one, they dont move much faster. These sloths might build up a speed of 2mph on the ground.

There is not much differance between the two kinds of sloths, to look at them you would consider them to be the same. Most animals have seven cervical vertebrae (neck bones) from hamsters to whales even giraffes the two exceptions are the mantees and the two toed sloths which only have six cervical vertebrae. They are social animals and any species of them will accept the other, meaning they live amoungst each other and share food together.

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