Sloth Conservation Crisis and Data Deficiency
Sloths currently listed under “least concerned” category because of lack of data, making it “hard to get funding for an animal when they say ‘Oh it’s least concern’ and so really nobody cares”—but researchers are “literally seeing it every single day… areas where I knew there were sloths living 3 years ago in really high densities are completely void of sloths.”
Sloth Slow Digestion and Multi-Chambered Stomach
Sloths possess multi-chambered stomachs taking up ~30% of their body weight (one-third of entire body mass dedicated to digestion), with digestion so slow it takes weeks for them to fully digest single leaf—only needing to poop around once per week.
Sloth Heterothermy and Metabolic Depression
Sloths possess metabolism “even weirder than it seems on first glance”—don’t maintain stable internal temperature like most mammals; instead internal temperature changes with outside temperature, fluctuating as much as 10°C (more like ectotherms/lizards, cold-blooded animals).
Sloth Poop Dance and Moth-Algae Ecosystem
Sloths dutifully climb all the way down from trees once per week to poop (one of only reasons leaving trees), performing “poop dance”—“something that all sloths do… it looks like they’re twerking kind of in slow motion”—actually trying to dig little hole using their bum.
Sloth Slow Movement and Ultra-Low Metabolism
Sloths possess the slowest metabolism of any mammal in animal kingdom, rivaled only by mammals deep in hibernation—three-toed sloths burn as little as 130 calories/day, two-toed sloths ~300 calories/day, enabling survival on minimal food intake that would starve similar-sized mammals.