Exploring the Rainforest

Sloths are more literate than you might think. This one is reading an old book by Harry Pariser, the creator of "Tour the Rainforest"!

Sloths are arboreal, soft furred creatures. Residing in the highest tree tops and living off plants and leaves, are the distantly-related, brown-throated three-toed sloth (perezoso de tres dedos) and the rarer two-toed sloth (perezoso de dos dedos). Their Spanish name (perezoso) means "lazy," which perfectly fits their somnolent attitude, slow movements, and ability to hang upside down for long periods without moving. A sloth differs from other edentates in that it has well-developed crushing teeth and a digestive tract akin to a grazing ruminant (cud chewer). It uses its many-chambered stomach to digest leaves through bacterial fermentation. Long-limbed and clawed creatures, sloths are camouflaged by the blue-green and green single-cell algae which grow on microscopic grooves and notches on its fur. Some species of moths feed on this algae. Cecropia (guarumo) trees are a particular favorite of sloths and often provide the best view. They descend once a week or so to defecate, carefully digging a hole with their stubby tails and burying their feces; one explanation for their descent, which exposes them to predators, is that the decomposition of their feces at the tree's base might provide them with a higher quality food supply. Apparently practicing a form of recycling, sloth pellets may return to the tree half the nutrients that the beast has taken. As sloths generally feed on only 15 to 40 trees in the period of a few months and have a single tree they return to frequently, this seems to be an intelligent investment. But this is not the only way they contribute to the ecosystem. Beetles, moths, and mites live on sloths and deposit their eggs in the sloth's dung.

There is an Android version and an iTunes version.

St. John Visitors:

Please check out Explore St. John, our new travel app to St. John, which supplies comprehensive information (useful for residents and visitors alike) along with pictures, maps and links to hundreds of videos and relevant websites.

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