How Sloths Defend Themselves

• Natural camouflage. Sloths possess a symbiotic relationship with the algae that grows on their fur.
• However, when threatened, they will emit hissing sounds, low cries, and moans. Their main tool of defense is camouflage, although claws and teeth are also used to protect themselves. Sloth teeth and nails grow continuously throughout their life; therefore, it is impossible to determine the age of a wild sloth.
• In fact they only climb down once a week to go 'relieve' themselves. Although mostly docile, sloths can defend themselves with their sharp claws.Their main form of protection however is their camouflage. Predators, beside people, include large snakes, harpy and other birds. Also, jaguars and ocelots are a danger when the sloth is on the ground.

Sloths are well-known as one of the slowest mammals on earth. The lethargic creatures subsist on such a low-calorie count coming from plants, insects, and sometimes small lizards, that they do not have the energy to do much more than hang around and sleep in trees all day. And hanging around is what they do best.

These sweet and somewhat adorably-funny looking animals do have pretty long claws, though, and it often makes people wonder if sloths can be dangerous to humans. Many tourists find it hard to believe that the hippopotamus is one of the most dangerous creatures known to man. After all, they appear cute and are so big and presumably fat that one could never imagine how fast a hippo could move on land before taking its kill. So, could the same situation be true of the sloth?

Thankfully, in the case of the sloth, they are not dangerous animals. Though a sloth, particularly a two-toed variety, will bite if provoked, in general, a sloth is not the type of animal to stalk its prey and eventually rip it to shreds. Quite the contrary is the case, as the natural reaction of the sloth when in stressful situations is to act still. Their ability to act so still, combined with their unusual ability to camouflage themselves with algae, creates a unique ability to protect themselves from danger. After all, if they don’t move and they blend into the background in their environment, it will make it hard for a predator to find them.

In this article, I discussed sloth predators including ones that are from the animal kingdom, ones that are from the human kingdom, and a couple that might surprise you. I also discussed how sloths are able to protect themselves from their predators. Predators and prey are part of the animal kingdom, which I totally understand. Mar 30, 2020 While sloths are lethargic and non-aggressive, they possess 4-inch claws that they use to defend themselves from predators. However, on the ground they can only travel about 53 feet per hour, making them easy to evade.

How Do Sloths Protect Themselves from Attackers?

Though sloths tend to be docile animals and are relatively harmless to humans, it is essential to understand that with any wild animal, if threatened, the natural reaction will be to protect themselves. Thus, if a sloth fails to defend itself through camouflage and stillness, it will not hesitate to use its claws or teeth as a way to protect against a predator or attacker.

Sloths are preyed upon by jaguars, snakes (anacondas in particular), harpy eagles, and margays. When threatened, the sloth will slash out at the predator by using their sharp claws. The claws on a sloth can get to be three to four inches in length, and are extremely sharp. Thus, if a predator comes at the sloth, the slow will swing its arms and legs at the attacker with the intent to inflict damage. In other cases, and sometimes in combination with the use of claws, a sloth will also use its teeth to bite its attacker. These cheek teeth, embedded in the sloth’s mouth, are incredibly sharp and can easily inflict damage that can end the life of a predator.

Those who have worked at sloth sanctuaries or have had sloths as exotic pets will be sure to indicate that a sloth has scarred them. This isn’t to say that the sloth intended to cause harm. However, when you are dealing with an animal with claws that are up to four inches in length, interactions may inevitably lead to some scratches here and there. And with any animal that scratches or bites a human, this can lead to infection for the recipient of that scratch or bite. For this reason, even though sloths are mostly harmless and are not considered dangerous, it is best to keep a safe distance and respect the space around the sloth, especially when they are in their natural habitat.

What You Need to Know About Sloths

Though we have already established that sloths, in general, are not dangerous, there are some things that you need to know if you plan to go out on a sloth-sleuthing mission.

• A sloth has a very strong vise-like grip that they can retain even after they die. This means that if, for some reason, a sloth is aggravated or threatened to the point of feeling the need to defend itself, it can get a secure grip on you.
• Sloths can turn their heads almost 360-degrees. This means that wherever you are, the sloth can keep an eye on you. This ability to see from just about any angle serves as a critical defensive mechanism. However, it also means that you won’t be able to sneak up on the animal, even if your intentions are good. Thus, make sure you don’t try to approach one of these animals slyly. A sloth will know where you are coming and will be willing to protect itself if it feels threatened.
• When humans handle a sloth, especially one that is in its natural environment can cause the animal to become disoriented. And, just like when a human is disoriented, they may make rash decisions and have unpredictable behaviors. For a sloth, these unpredictable behaviors may result in a lashing from the animal’s claws or an excruciatingly painful bite from the sloth’s teeth.
• If you happen to come across a sloth during its weekly trip to its urination or defecation spot, be aware that the sloth may be more aware than ever. As it is, when a sloth is making its trek to take care of business, it risks its own life. And, the sloth knows that it is in danger and is at its most vulnerable when on the move. Further, the actual process of excretion for the sloth can be a bit like giving birth. If you think through the logistics of emptying your bowel only once per week, you can imagine the situation. This means that the sloth is especially exposed and will be on guard. As a result, any surprise, even from an unsuspecting tourist looking to capture the photo of all photos, may be the unexpected recipient of a sloth-induced injury.
• The fur on the sloth hosts a variety of fungi and parasites that are known to cause malaria and Chagas disease. Though the sloth may be able to host these dangers without ill effect, it doesn’t mean the same for a human should the human come in contact with the sloth.

Ultimately, though sloths are mostly safe animals to be around, it is essential to remember that they are still wild animals. Creatures such as the sloth are best viewed from a comfortable distance in the sloth’s natural habitat. By respecting the sloth and its environment, both the sloth and human admirer will be best protected.

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Conventional wisdom has it that sloths are simple, lazy creatures that do very little other than sleep all day. Even the very name “sloth” in most languages translates as some version of “lazy”. It seems astonishing that such an animal survives in the wild at all.

In 1749, French naturalist Georges Buffon was the first to describe the creature in his encyclopedia of life sciences, saying:

Slowness, habitual pain, and stupidity are the results of this strange and bungled conformation. These sloths are the lowest form of existence. One more defect would have made their lives impossible.

Given such a precedent, it is of little surprise that sloths are subject to such profound speculation and misinterpretation, ranging from the benign – that they sleep all day – to the creative anecdotes I regularly hear, such as: “Sloths are so stupid that they mistake their own arm for a tree branch”.

The truth is that sloths are incredibly slow movers, but for a very simple reason: survival. The fact that slow sloths have been on this planet for almost 64m years shows that they have a winning strategy. But in order to understand exactly what it is that makes them such slow movers, and why this works so well, we have to look at the biology of these unusual animals in more detail.

Three-toed sloths are indeed the slowest-moving mammals on the planet, but exactly how slow is slow? At the world’s only sloth sanctuary in Costa Rica, we have been monitoring the movement and activity patterns of wild sloths using small data loggers combined with tracking devices inside specially built “sloth backpacks”. We’ve found that, contrary to popular belief, sloths don’t actually spend inordinate amounts of time sleeping; they sleep for just eight to ten hours a day in the wild. They do move, but very slowly and always at the same, almost measured, pace.

Moving slowly unequivocally requires less energy than moving fast, and it is this principal that underlies the sloths’ unusual ecology.

Sloths are not the only creatures in the animal kingdom to adopt a slow pace. Cold-blooded ectotherms such as frogs and snakes, are commonly subject to enforced slow movement when faced with cold temperatures, due to their inability to regulate their own temperature independently of the environment. Just like any chemical reaction, cold muscles are slow muscles so cold reptiles are slow reptiles.

This is in stark contrast to most homeothermic mammals which maintain a stable, high core temperature via a process of adaptive thermogenesis, and are consequently able to move fast and effectively regardless of the ambient conditions. But this athletic ability comes at a cost: high body temperatures mean high metabolic rates, and somehow the energy bill must be paid using food.

So where do sloths fit into this dichotomy? They move slowly at all temperatures and, unsurprisingly, deviate from the typical homeothermic mammalian plan by operating at lower body temperatures than most mammals, while apparently having a reduced ability to thermoregulate. The average temperature of the three-toed sloth is around 32.7℃ (91℉), compared to humans’ 36.5℃/97.8℉.

Much in the manner of ectotherms, sloths depend on behavioural and postural adjustments to control their own heat loss and gain, showing daily core temperature fluctuations of up to 10℃. By perpetually moving slowly and partially departing from full homeothermy, sloths burn very little energy and are able to function with the lowest metabolic rate of any non-hibernating mammal, with estimates ranging from 40–74% of the predicted value relative to the sloth’s body mass.

As a result of all this, sloths don’t need to acquire much energy or to spend time looking for it. Both two and three-fingered sloths have a predominantly folivorous (leaf-based) diet, consuming material with a notably low caloric content. There are plenty of other mammals which specialise on a leaf-based diet, but usually these animals compensate for their low-calorie diet by consuming relatively large quantities of food. Fellow leaf-eating howler monkeys move at a normal pace but consume three times as many leaves per kilogram of body mass as sloths, digesting their foodstuff comparatively quickly.

How Sloths Defend Themselves Against

Therein lies another sloth peculiarity: for the majority of mammals, digestion rate depends on body size, with larger animals generally taking longer to digest their food. Sloths appear to break this rule to an unprecedented extent. The exact rate of digestion remains unclear, but current estimations for the passage of food from ingestion to excretion range from 157 hours to a staggering 50 days (1,200 hours).

Unsurprisingly, the sloth’s four-chambered stomach is constantly full, and so more leaves can only be ingested when digesta leaves the stomach and enters the small intestine. Food intake and, critically, energy expenditure are likely limited by digestion rate and room in the stomach. Indeed, the abdominal contents of a sloth can account for up to 37% of their body mass.

All this points to an extraordinary lifestyle, with sloths living on a metabolic knife edge where minimal energy expenditure is finely balanced with minimal energy intake.

With their plethora of energy-saving adaptations, sloths physically don’t have the ability to move very fast. And with this, they do not have the capacity to defend themselves or run away from predators, as a monkey might. Instead, their survival is entirely dependent upon camouflage – a factor aided by their symbiotic relationship with algae growing on their fur. Sloths’ main predators – big cats like jaguars, ocelots and birds such as harpy eagles – all primarily detect their prey visually, and it is likely that sloths simply move at a pace that doesn’t get them noticed.

How Sloths Defend Themselves Protect

The sloth life is certainly not the “lowest form of existence”, but as strategic as that of any other animal. They are energy-saving mammals taking life at a slow pace to avoid the rush and tumble for food, while subscribing the movement patterns that help them avoid being identified as prey. There must be a lesson somewhere in that for all of us.