About Sloths In Panama

A couple months ago someone told us they saw a Sloth across the street in the woods. OK... Cool; I've  never seen one. Well, a week ago while walking our dogs we saw one hugging a tree about ten feet off the ground.

 

Yesterday (again walking the dogs) a man was standing still looking up into the trees and voila......if we looked hard and long we saw a Sloth all curled up on a fairly small branch at least 40 feet up.  The guy said he saw it at the same place the day before. 

 

Well, today we were on our balcony 15 floors up and saw something laying in the middle of the concrete street.  It blended into the concrete a lot so I got the binoculars out.  Another Sloth.  Had he been hit by a car or what.  Closer look....no blood, all limbs moving.  The Sloth just looked tired!  They are proportioned just like humans.....long arms and legs so he looked like a human child laying there.

 

Some folks came by, helped Sloth into a box and took him to the woods.  So we Googled "Sloths".

 

They are totally docile critters so it's safe to pick them up to move them....just watch out for those 6 long toes.  You may look like a tree to a Sloth and those long arms and toes do all the work getting Sloth up a tree where he spends 99% of his time.  We read that Sloth come down once a week to do bathroom duty which he then carefully buries near the last tree he lived in. They eat leaves and insects.

 

The problem our Sloth had is due to 20 feet of concrete he had to cross. Sloth uses his arms and claws (toes) to grab into the dirt and those strong arms to pull him forward.  He can't dig his claws into concrete and he had become exhausted trying.  Fortunately this road has little to no traffic for hours at a time so Sloth survives this crossing.