Sloth Prejudice: This Animal's Smart, Not Lazy

When your roommate lies in bed for an entire weekend, or even well into Monday morning, you tend to call them a sloth - because let's face it, sloths are known for being incredibly slow and lazy. Sure, "Zootopia" character Dash can drive around in a sports car, but he's pretty much the exception.

However, you might want to think twice before calling a lazy person a sloth. Despite being thought to be simple, lazy creatures, IFL Science noted that they are incredibly slow movers for a reason: they too, need to survive. The fact that they have been on the planet for around 64 million years is a testament to the effectiveness of their survival skills, too.

People believe that sloths sleep most of the day, but new research showed that they actually only spend eight to ten hours of sleep in the wild, pretty much like young humans do - and they don't even have to rush to work come Monday morning. Sloths do move, but very slowly always at the same time, and at an almost measured pace. This slow movement requires less energy. Sloths move slowly whatever the temperature they find themselves in, which makes them different from mammals. Pair this with their reduced inability to thermoregulate, and that means they need to slow down to survive.

Sloths depend on behavioral and postural adjustments to control their body heat, so by moving slowly and partially, they burn very little energy and are able to function even with the lowest metabolic rate of non-hiberating mammals. Because of this, sloths don't get a lot of energy, or even spend a lot of time looking for it. How Stuff Works noted that by sitting motionless, they slowly and carefully digest their meal, extracting every available nutrient from their diet that consists mostly of leaves.

Besides, BBC noted that when other species scatter in the presence of predators, sloths just hide away, invisible from the harpy eagles, their most feared foes.