Linne's two toed sloths, Monique and Cecil LOVE their greens and veggies and our keepers come up with creative ways to offer their daily nutrition using many different devices to forage through... as you can see in these images. They are able to investigate, forage and then consume at their own pace (slowwww...of course...but on their terms). Sloths are folivores, they are primarily, specialized herbivores that typically consume leaves in their wild spaces. However, they may also search out and munch on fruit, tree buds, twigs, insects and even small rodents (we know Monique will even take some bites of fish from her fellow house mate, the Cattle Egret on occasion). Leaves have low nutritional value which means the sloth has evolved to be a super-conserver of energy. They sleep upwards of 15-18 hours per day, they move slow and are purposeful with every movement. Their digestion is also slow, sometimes taking up to a month to digest their food. Sloths have a conservation status of Least Concern (IUCN), however their populations are decreasing due to habitat loss, wildfire destruction of forests, land fragmentation, illegal wildlife trade, roadway and power line injury and mortality. Range countries, along with non-governmental rescue facilities work tirelessly to save ALL sloths, to mitigate loss, and even come up with amazing ideas for the sloths and some many other animals, to use alternate pathways to move around their habitats such as rope bridges. Niabi Zoo applauds the Sloth Institute of Costa Rica for their amazing work helping sloth and other species in their native habitats. Images of our lovely sloth pair courtesy of Allie M and Leanne P (fb)

Wednesday Weigh In; with dashing Dasher, Yellow Backed Duiker Dasher has always been a pretty good operant conditioning student when it comes to collecting his weight, targeting, stationing etc....but we ramped his training up a bit and added a chute/scale apparatus, so we can begin working on his hooves, when needed...well as you can see here he wanted to help set up the scale, he eagerly accepted his yummy reinforcement foods, and popped right on the new chute/scale when it was time to try it out. Great job Team Dasher! Images courtesy of Tony F and Sammi T (fb)