Yesterday we went to a sloth rescue, Aviarios del Caribe. Amazing, and I'm so jealous that I didn't come up with the idea. The woman that started the rescue had a bed and breakfast, and was known around the area as the animal lady. Some locals found an injured sloth and took it to her, and she nursed it back to health. From there on she took in injured and abused sloths, as well as orphaned baby sloths. We started the tour viewing the baby sloths - which we could not touch. God, I want one so bad. We saw the babies again at the end of the tour outside in the grass getting their "exercise", and one was just laying there, splaid out crying like a human baby. From there we went on a 45 minute canoe ride through the jungle to spot sloths in the wild. As about 30 seconds after leaving the dock there was one hanging on a tree just above the canoe. All the pictures by the way have been uploaded to my costa rica photo album. We spotted either two or three on the canoe ride, along with other creatures - including the Jesus Christ lizard that only Don saw. Also during the canoe tour our guide got out of the boat with a knife and ran off into the jungle. He came back with some flowers for me. Flowers and sloths, what more could a girl ask for? Once done with the canoe tour, we got to man handle some adult sloths! We basically just got to go into their cages and pet them - though all I wanted to do was grab one and run - but it was still freakin' awesome. The first sloth we visited was named Millie, and was by far the coolest. She had a hanging basket chair thing in her area that she sat on and as Don says, looked like Buddah meditating. She stuck her tounge out and yawned alot. When we rubbed her belly she just leaned back and shut her eyes. The next sloth was named Toyota. Toyota was brought to the rescue because he climbed on some power lines and was electrocuted. His arm had to be amputated and to everyone's surpise he recovered very quickly - thus the name Toyota because they take a beating and keep on going. Finally we got to see a pair that stayed together. Normally, sloths are solitary animals, but these two were raised as babies together at the rescue and had bonded. They let the babies stay together since they don't get to bond with a mother. The sloths that are raised there as babies are never released into the wild, as they do not have the skills to survive. Since they won't be released into the wild, the staff didn't really see a reason to separate the two adults that grew up together. It was explained to us that even though they aren't brother and sister, since they were raised together they view themselves as brother and sister, and would never mate with each other because of that. Candler and I fed the two carrots, and the female sucked on her fingers like a kid sucking its thumb. A few fun facts that I learned about sloths that I did not know - they do not drink water (they get their water from their diet), they come out of the tree once a week only to poop, the are xenarthrans (meaning their body temperature is dependant on their surroundings) and are related to the anteater as well. Some baby sloth video (not taken by me, but from the sanctuary):
I quit my job to come down to Costa Rica with my boyfriend and his 7 year old son for 2.5 months. We are traveling around to different areas to see if we would like to make a permanent move to the country. My dog is still in the states. I miss my dog.
Yesterday we went to a sloth rescue, Aviarios del Caribe. Amazing, and I'm so jealous that I didn't come up with the idea. The woman that started the rescue had a bed and breakfast, and was known around the area as the animal lady. Some locals found an injured sloth and took it to her, and she nursed it back to health. From there on she took in injured and abused sloths, as well as orphaned baby sloths. We started the tour viewing the baby sloths - which we could not touch. God, I want one so bad. We saw the babies again at the end of the tour outside in the grass getting their "exercise", and one was just laying there, splaid out crying like a human baby. From there we went on a 45 minute canoe ride through the jungle to spot sloths in the wild. As about 30 seconds after leaving the dock there was one hanging on a tree just above the canoe. All the pictures by the way have been uploaded to my costa rica photo album. We spotted either two or three on the canoe ride, along with other creatures - including the Jesus Christ lizard that only Don saw. Also during the canoe tour our guide got out of the boat with a knife and ran off into the jungle. He came back with some flowers for me. Flowers and sloths, what more could a girl ask for? Once done with the canoe tour, we got to man handle some adult sloths! We basically just got to go into their cages and pet them - though all I wanted to do was grab one and run - but it was still freakin' awesome. The first sloth we visited was named Millie, and was by far the coolest. She had a hanging basket chair thing in her area that she sat on and as Don says, looked like Buddah meditating. She stuck her tounge out and yawned alot. When we rubbed her belly she just leaned back and shut her eyes. The next sloth was named Toyota. Toyota was brought to the rescue because he climbed on some power lines and was electrocuted. His arm had to be amputated and to everyone's surpise he recovered very quickly - thus the name Toyota because they take a beating and keep on going. Finally we got to see a pair that stayed together. Normally, sloths are solitary animals, but these two were raised as babies together at the rescue and had bonded. They let the babies stay together since they don't get to bond with a
mother. The sloths that are raised there as babies are never released into the wild, as they do not have the skills to survive. Since they won't be released into the wild, the staff didn't really see a reason to separate the two adults that grew up together. It was explained to us that even though they aren't brother and sister, since they were raised together they view themselves as brother and sister, and would never mate with each other because of that. Candler and I fed the two carrots, and the female sucked on her fingers like a kid sucking its thumb. A few fun facts that I learned about sloths that I did not know - they do not drink water (they get their water from their diet), they come out of the tree once a week only to poop, the are xenarthrans (meaning their body temperature is dependant on their surroundings) and are related to the anteater as well. Some baby sloth video (not taken by me, but from the sanctuary):
No comments:
Post a Comment