![]() "In the wild, a two-fingered sloth is going to keep her baby up to a year," Trimer explains. "They are very different animals, they should not have been called by the same name," Trimer says. The three-fingered are the more visible of the two, as they tend to move during the day, whereas the two-fingered sloths are nocturnal and stay conceal during the day. The sanctuary takes in both species indigenous to the area, the two-fingered Choloepus and the three-fingered Bradypus, which is famous for its perma-smile. This is an evolutionary conundrum, as it leaves sloths vulnerable to predators. And they only defecate once a week, climbing all the way down the tree to do so. ![]() Sloths are also the slowest mammal on the planet, taking 30 days to digest just one leaf. Some of those differences are that sloths don't store milk like other mammals - in fact there is no external signs of pregnancy, not even a baby bump. "Now we're just starting to realize how different to every other mammal they actually are." They just sat in trees all day and they didn't really do much, so they went under the radar for a very long time," Cliffe says. "People thought that they were so slow and they weren't very interesting. Young sloths train at the sanctuary's jungle gym Image: DW/M. Essentially this allows us to see what the animal is doing and where it's doing it."Ĭliffe is one of the few out there who is working to learn more about the mysterious animal. It stores it in something I've christened the 'sloth backpack.' It also has a tracker in there, so I can go and find the sloths. "I'm working with something called the Daily Diary," Cliffe explains, "which is a data logger that records everything the animal does, almost as though the animal was writing a diary. We've had some here that have been set on fire, or run over or beaten with sticks." "In Costa Rica that can be quite a problem because a lot of people abuse the animals. Baby sloths enjoy holding on to stuffed animals - they were abandoned by their mothers Image: DW/M. "In every language, the word sloth translates as lazy, and some people believe that a sloth is a deadly sin and therefore the animal is the devil's animal," says Becky Cliffe, a British PhD student who is spearheading a long-term research project on sloths in the wild: from what they eat and how they sleep to their behavioral patterns and population density. Adult sloths, on the other hand, are brought in with serious wounds caused by deforestation, traffic and power lines, and even human brutality. Many babies are found on the Costa Rica rainforest floor - they are picked up by employees of the Ministry of Environment, Energy and Telecommunications who accidentally stumble upon them, sometimes only days old. One theory suggests the abandonment could be related to genetic mutations, caused by pesticides. Most days, crowds of visitors explore the grounds and take photos, cooing over the adorable sloths.īut apart from producing a panorama of natural treasures, the rainforests of Costa Rica are also cultivating a mysterious phenomenon: mother sloths here abandon their babies more often than mother sloths in other rainforests, such as in Columbia. Lush and tranquil, the sanctuary is sprawled over 120 hectares (300 acres) of protected land. With 150 sloths currently residing at the sanctuary, the facility is the only of its kind in the world. ![]() The nursery itself is an outdoor area where each animal is kept in its own spacious cage, equipped with blankets and stuffed toys. We don't know if it's a birth defect, or if he was maybe sucking on his claws or heel in utero, but his mouth doesn't close all the way, which means he can't form suction." Feeding time for sloths at the sanctuary - some of them have to be fed by hand Image: DW/M. Linus came to the sacntuary at a very young age, Trimer recalls. At the sanctuary, Linus is a staff favorite. The docile baby sloth's deformed mouth may have been the reason for his mother abandoning him. Some sloths, like one-year-old Linus, need to be fed by hand. Claire Trimer, nursery supervisor at the Aviarios Sloth Sanctuary, weighs and feeds around half a dozen baby sloths every morning. ![]()
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