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The JMZ Welcomes Luna the Sloth!
Questions for John Aikin, JMZ Executive Director
Can you tell us about sloths and what makes them unique?
Sloths are incredibly interesting creatures. They can be divided into two groups: two-toed and three-toed. Our sloth, Luna, is a two-toed sloth from Guyana. Surprisingly, the two groups are not as closely related as scientists originally thought. The fossil record indicates giant ground sloths roamed North and South America during the Ice Age– some of these sloths weighed up to 3,000 pounds! Three different types of giant ground sloths have been found at the La Brea Tar Pits in Los Angeles. Sloths are related to some unlikely creatures, such as armadillos and anteaters.
In the wild, many sloths are green. This is due to algae that grows on their fur. Being green is advantageous in the wild because it helps camouflage sloths from predators. This algae feeds an ecosystem of organisms, most notably a moth that lays its eggs every time the sloth visits the forest floor. The tropics are full of these kinds of symbiotic relationships, and it is important for us to tell visitors to the JMZ about the interdependence many animals have on each other. Sloth fur is also well-suited for humid environments. Fur on the belly flows toward their backs, so that excess precipitation falls off when they are upside down.
Sloths spend most of their time upside down. Surprisingly, they don’t have many muscles in their legs and arms to keep them from falling. Instead, they hang from hook-like claws on the ends of their arms and legs. This takes little energy and not much strength. In order to stay secured to trees, sloths will often only take one limb off of a branch at a time, so that they always have three points of contact. Sloths are solitary creatures, but because different sloths have varied preferences on which leaves they consume, many can live in a small area. They don’t compete for the same food, so the diversity of the rainforest supports a dense population.
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