20 October: International Sloth Day

Today is International Sloth Day. Here are ten interesting facts about sloths.

1. Sloths belong to the order Pilosa, so they are related to anteaters and armadillos.
2. They have a reputation for being slow and lazy, and while they are slow, they only sleep for 10 hours a day.
3. Their digestive systems are incredibly slow. It takes them about 30 days to digest a leaf. If they get too cold the Bacteria which help their digestion can die and as a result a sloth could starve to death even with a full stomach.
4. Sloths move along the ground at just 2m (6.5 ft) a minute. In the trees they are slightly quicker at 3m (10 ft) a minute. The fact they move so slow has one advantage – algae grows on their fur and acts as camouflage. However, there are a couple of things sloths are quite quick at. One is swimming – they can swim three times faster than they can move on land, and can hold their breath for up to 40 minutes underwater. The other thing they're quick at is sex. Sloth copulation takes five seconds.
5. They only poo once a week, and that is the most dangerous thing they do. They have to leave the trees where they live to go to the loo on the ground. The fact they are creatures of habit and tend to go at the same time and in the same place means ground-based predators can get them. 50% of sloths literally die on the toilet. When they go, they can lose a third of their body weight. Females which are ready to mate poo more often – sloths are solitary so this is how they advertise that they are feeling randy.
6. Sloths are usually 50 to 60 cm long. The prehistoric sloth Megatherium, however, was as big as an Elephant - about six or seven metres tall and weighed between four and seven tonnes. There were also aquatic sloths – no doubt the reason they swim so well – and sloths which walked on two legs.
7. Sloths can extend their tongues 10 to 12 inches out of their mouths. They have nipples in their armpits and three extra vertebrae in their necks, so they can swivel their heads 270 degrees.
8. They're specially adapted to hanging upside down in trees. Their internal organs are attached to their ribs so they don't cause pressure on their lungs.
9. There are two types of sloth – the two-toed and the three-toed. The three-toed sloth is slightly smaller and slower. All sloths have three toes. The difference is the two-toed sloth has two fingers on each hand. Two-toed sloths are nocturnal, while three-toed sloths are most active during the day.
10. They don't sweat, which means they don't smell, so predators can't sniff them out.

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