The slowest animal is a sloth

What is the slowest animal on the planet? If you think about it, there may be several options: snail, sloth, turtle. It turns out that the scientists conducted a comparative analysis. As a result, it became clear that the slowest animal on earth is a three-toed sloth (and his two-toed fellow).

It was easy to win

He won in many respects. And analyzed not only the speed of movement, in which a sloth, by the way, is not the slowest. Close attention of scientists was awarded such vital processes as the duration of sleep, the attitude to bearing and growing offspring, the way of nutrition. The winner is sleeping a lot, about 15 hours a day. Infant period, when the baby only hangs on his mother and feeds on her milk, lasts four months. Food for the sloth is served by leaves, fruits, as well as the flowers of the tree on which he lives. Long paws allow animals to reach freely to food, so they do not need to move often.

They will be in one place, until all the foliage around to which they can reach is over. And the digestion of food - this is the only occupation for which the animal spends its life. Therefore, it has a huge stomach and a small brain without convolutions. In order to drink, you must go down from the tree. And to do this the sloth has no desire. There are dangers waiting downstairs, and he is not a master to move around the land. Although observations have shown that sloths like water, including can swim well. But most often they have to be content with the dew from the leaves, in order to quench their thirst.

Fundamentals of Being

The slowest animal reacts to changes in the world around it with the same slowness as it moves. Their wool serves as an excellent breeding ground for insects and algae, which during the rainy season color the sloth green. Protect their young animals are also in no hurry. They remain unperturbed even when the baby falls, unable to hold onto the mother's fur. Laziness comes to the point that even descend from the tree, they are not in the usual way, creeping from branch to branch, but fall, curled up in a ball. But this is not their own desire. Sluggishness is promoted by foods that are low in calories. It does not give the sloth a lot of energy, it makes it save its reserves, reducing the number of movements. The blood of this animal has a low temperature, because all the processes in the body are in a "sleeping" mode.

Why does not die

Running from the enemy sloths are in no hurry. Yes it is not possible for them. On the ground, they move so slowly that their speed can not even be called a turtle, because the turtle moves almost five times faster. Such slowness is only in the hands of hunters who catch the slowest animal to cook from its meat, resembling lamb, a delicious dish. If a sloth dies of his own death, he simply falls from the tree. A corpse who finds a corpse can use claws to make a necklace. The slowest animal in captivity, where it does not threaten anything, can survive 32 years, and in the wild only about 10-20 years. At the same time, it has remarkable endurance, the ability to heal such wounds, which would become deadly to other species. The sluggard is immune to poisons.

What does the slowest animal in the world look like?

The photo provides an opportunity to understand that a sloth is like a small monkey with bulging eyes. He has a large head and long fingers with strong claws, with which he clings to the branches when moving. Its wool is very thick and grows in the direction from the abdomen to the back. This is necessary in order that the rainwater can not soak the fur coat. Nature herself took care to protect the slowest animal. The color of his coat allows you to merge with the branches of trees and hide in the foliage. This makes the sloth unnoticed, especially since he eats at night, and during the daytime only sleeps.

Despite the fact that these animals do not do anything interesting, watching them is curious. If you wait until the sloth decides to make a gesture, you can see how he does it so slowly that there is a feeling of watching a slow motion picture. And their appearance is funny. These are not monkeys at all, although they are similar to them. In our strip they can be seen only in zoos. The natural habitat of a sloth is the forests of South and Central America. Do not think that in captivity they are living badly. In the zoo, they are deprived of enemies and live almost three times longer than in the wild.