iNat User agonzalo Photographs the Birth of a Sloth in Panama - Observation of the Week, 2/16/20

iNat user @agonzalo photographed a Brown-throated Three-toed Sloth giving birth in Panama, and it’s our Observation of the Week!

“The story of the picture of the sloth giving birth is based on applying a basic equation,” explains Aitor Gonzalo. “perseverance plus extreme LUCK!

I didn't see the full delivery. I heard a loud screech that caught my attention and managed to see the sloth at a distance of about 150 meters. Through the camera I could see that the mother was manipulating the newborn but at the moment everything was very confusing for me. In the photos you can understand better what was happening.

While his primary interest is birds, Aitor says “I never miss the chance to photograph sloths, monkeys, and other animals, alone or in company with their babies. Obviously, a birth in nature is to win the lottery.”

Famously slow-moving, three-toed sloths eat leaves and digest them at a sarlacc-like rate, sometimes taking 2 weeks to digest a meal! Sleeping in trees for about 16 hours a day, they make their way to the forest floor only once every 7-8 days in order to defecate, and as you can see they even give birth up in the treetops. Newborn sloths, like the one in Aitor’s photos, gestated for about seven months. It will spend the next five months or so clinging to its mother before it starts to climb on its own in earnest.

Aitor has always been interested in nature, but he credits his two daughters, Milena and Costanza, for his current “real real true passion for nature (I mean me as an already old guy and eager to go out and spend most day taking photographs).” One daughter has a PhD (earned in France) and studies soil microbes, while the other is studying Environmental Policy Analysis and Planning at UC-Davis in California. “Both of my daughters…

are passionate about nature, the environment, and its conservation and have discussed it with so much enthusiasm that it is extremely difficult not to get engaged. Moreover, both have been vegetarians for many years, and to challenge them and myself, I became vegan.

A regular iNat and eBird user, Aitor (above, with @ruthpierson and @claryliz) finds iNaturalist to be “an essential tool. It has everything. It helps you identify animals, it keeps records of everything, you can get statistics, it is interactive and user friendly. Besides, it is fun and challenging.”

- by Tony Iwane. Some quotes have been lightly edited for clarity and flow.

- Panama is part of the iNaturalist network!

- Sloths do swim - here is a pygmy three-toed sloth making its way across the water to look for a mate.

Posted on February 17, 2020 05:16 AM by tiwane