Top sloth blogs from 2021
It’s the end of the year again—time to reflect, reorganize, and recap the best of 2021. So here are our top 10 blogs, articles, photos, and stories.
“But wait!” you say, “How do I know these are really the best? Maybe you’re trying to pawn off some substandard content on me! I’m a discerning reader, you know. My time is valuable!”
We know! These posts have been selected according to very stringent internal standards, such as by monitoring which articles got the most web traffic this year. Our readers have voted with their clicks, and the results are in. Enjoy!
1. Slothopedia:
This is a project still in its infancy, but it is live and it is here! We aim to make Slothopedia the largest and most scientifically accurate source of sloth information on the internet. For sloth lovers, children, grad students, or just curious people, the Slothopedia will have it all!
We launched the main page during Sloth Month—October–and will be adding new articles, revising and expanding it during 2022.
Visit Slothopedia
2. Baby sloths: everything you always wanted to know!
A few months ago you could Google “baby sloth” and SloCo was not even in the first 40 pages of search results! (And everybody knows that nobody reads beyond the first page, never mind the other 39.)
This was unacceptable. We ARE the sloth experts, and we have a nearly encyclopedic collection of accurate, ethical sloth photos.
So we wrote the most amazing mega-post about sloth babies, and guess what? In a matter of weeks, with your help sharing and reposting, we’re now in the top three! (Depending on which country you Google from.)
Click here and help us get that number even better, plus of course, getting your fill of sloth-adorableness.
Baby Sloths
3. Tracking Diaries
People love jungle adventures! Okay, they love to read about jungle adventures, preferably from a climate-controlled armchair with a drink nearby. Happily for you, we delivered on your wish, and here they are!
The tracking diaries are the chronicles of our tracking team in the field. In these blogs, you’ll find a lot of sloth chasing, equipment failures, equipment theft, missing equipment, mud, swamps, barb wire fences, mosquitos, and all the cool stuff we love about studying sloths and doing science while walking in circles chasing erratic radio signals.
Tracking Diaries
.
4. Searching for the elusive maned sloths of Brazil
In March this year, we had the amazing opportunity to join professor Gastón Giné–one of the leading experts in the maned sloth research–in Brazil to help him tag and fit GPS backpacks to these endangered sloths in the Atlantic forest of Sapiranga Reserve.
Maned Sloths of Brazil
.
5. Three-fingered sloth adopts a two-fingered orphan
This was one of our most popular stories this year (although it was written at the end of 2020). Some local tour guides contacted us after they made an amazing observation: they found a case of spontaneous inter-species adoption, in the wild! The story is as heartwarming as it is astounding.
Three-fingered sloth adopts a two-fingered baby
.
6. A new national symbol
In this blog we explained how sloths became a national symbol for Costa Rica, what this means for conservation, how we were involved in developing this law, and how it improves the lives of sloths.
The Sloth: a new national symbol for Costa Rica
.
7. True stories behind these baby sloth photos
You have already seen this photo all over the internet. But have you ever wondered about the name and the story of the most famous sloth on the planet? Wonder no more! We have the truth!
Famous baby sloths!
.
8. Ancient sloths were not leaf eaters?
Apparently, some of them were “opportunistic omnivores”, just like your friend who wants to become vegetarian but can’t pass up on the free hot dogs at the company picnic.
Mylodon, oportunistic omnivore?
.
9. Arislothl & Slothocles: Taking Things Philosophically
William Hartston, the famous journalist, author, and sloth lover, wrote this entry (originally published on Beachcomber column for 11 September 2021 / Daily Express) about what can we learn from the philosophy of sloths.
Sloth Philosophy
.
10. Are humans the baddies?
According to one of the latest research articles on the subject, it turns out that we don’t have giant sloths pooping avocados anymore because ancient humans hunted them to extinction some thousands of years ago… Oops. At least we still have the avocados.
Did humans cause the extinction of the giant ground sloths?
-Cecilia Pamich
(Reviewed by Ames Reeder)
