Sloth
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- Sloth is also one of the Seven Deadly Sins.
Sloths are a handful of species of slow-moving, herbivorous, arboreal South American mammals. The family is split into two genuses, the two-toed and the three-toed sloths. Fossils of gigantic ground sloths such as Megatherium have been found in Patagonia.
Habits
Living sloths use their clawed feet to hang upside down from tree branches, where they feed on leaves. The remarkably non-nutritious nature of such a diet may necessitate their habitual lethargy.
Sloths defecate extremely infrequently (typically once a week). Yet remarkably, instead of just letting go from the treetops, they descend to the ground to use a single favoured sloth lavatory, which over the years may grow to mountainous proportions, exposing themselves to considerable danger in the process.
The two-toed sloth is in fact so inert that symbiotic algae commonly grows in its fur, making it the only mammal that appears to be green. This, along with its typical motionlessness, affords it excellent camouflage in the trees.
Creationist perspective
Creation scientists believe that the sloth, in common with all ground dwelling animals, originated in the Middle East. After the Great Flood they were probably dispersed by rafting which enabled them to colonize South America as part of the Post-Diluvian Diasporas.
Links
- Xenarthra.org about sloths and similar mammals
