Maned Sloth - Ecology and Behavior

Ecology and Behavior

Maned sloths are solitary diurnal animals, spending from 60–80% of their day asleep, with the rest more or less equally divided between feeding and travelling. Sloths sleep in crotches of trees or by dangling from branches by their legs and tucking their head in between their forelegs.

Maned sloths are folivores, and feed exclusively on tree and liana leaves, especially Cecropia. Although individual animals seem to prefer leaves from particular species of tree, the species as a whole is able to adapt to a wide range of tree types. Younger leaves are preferred to older, and tree leaves are preferred to liana leaves. Individual maned sloths have reported to travel over a home range of 0.5 to 6 hectares (1.2 to 15 acres), with estimated population densities of 0.1 to 1.25 per hectare (0.040 to 0.51 per acre).

Maned sloths rarely descend from the trees because, when on a level surface, they are unable to stand and walk, only being able to drag themselves along with their front legs and claws. They travel to the ground only to defecate or to move between trees when they cannot do so through the branches. The sloth's main defenses are to stay still and to lash out with its formidable claws. It can swim well.