MAMMALS

Sloths are so slow that algae grows on their fur.

They digest a single leaf for weeks and climb down to poop just once a week.

2 min read
Sloths are so slow that algae grows on their fur.
THE FULL STORY

Sloths live life in extreme slow motion. They move so little that green algae grows in their fur, which actually helps camouflage them among the leaves.

Their digestion is just as slow. A sloth can take several weeks to fully digest one meal of leaves, and it has the slowest metabolism of almost any mammal.

Strangest of all, sloths only come down from the trees to poop - about once a week. It’s risky and nobody is completely sure why they don’t just go from up high, which makes it one of biology’s odder mysteries.