The Brown-throated Sloth of Trinidad!!!

September 25, 2018August 31, 2018 C C 0 Comments

Now you may remember that last time when we were in Trinidad we saw the Brown-throated sloth of Trinidad high up in a tree in the main square – it wasn’t the best sighting… but it was our first wild sloth of the trip 🙂 🙂

Back in Trinidad – after Chuchini – we made it our utmost priority to head back to the square to see if we could see the sloth again…

We went straight back to the same tree where we had seen the sloth 8 days before and low and behold he was still there… BUT this time he wasn’t curled up in a ball high up in the tree… but was a bit lower down and moving… AND we could see him really well 🙂 🙂

Our second sighting of the sloth of Trinidad was so much better than the first 🙂

With chores to be done – we needed to buy bus tickets out of Trinidad – we left the sloth in the tree, but resolved to come back to see him one final time after our trip to the bus station…

We could never have anticipated what we found on our return…

YES, that’s right – the sloth had come down from the tree and was on the grass… Having read that sloths only come down out of their tree approximately every 8 days to go to the toilet we couldn’t believe our luck…

The sloth was obviously looking for a new tree to climb, and given they are quite far apart in the square in Trinidad, he had a ways to travel across the grass to reach the next available tree…

Wishing the closest tree was a little nearer…

This tree mustn’t be to the sloth’s liking…

The sloth – much to our dismay (as he looked quite uncomfortable moving on the ground) crawled straight past the tree… continuing onwards to a lamp post… at this stage he decided to haul himself off the ground and climb upwards… it wasn’t an easy climb – gripping a lamp post made of cold smooth metal is not an easy thing to do… he slid downwards a couple of times – it was actually sad to watch… and many questions about habitat destruction came to mind… when he got to the top of the lamp post – and there was nowhere for him to go – he looked wistful… ‘what now?’ I’m sure he was thinking…

CC watches on as the sloth starts his slow ascent of the lamp post.

The sloth surveys the square from the lamp post.

Pensive sloth at the top of the lamp post.

The sloth looks longingly at the tree canopy.

The sloth started his descent downwards – there was no other way – he couldn’t stay on the lamp post and there was no way of reaching the nearest tree from the top of the lamp post…

This time when the sloth was on the ground we were both extremely anxious… he was heading for the road… we didn’t know if we could pick up the sloth and place him safely on a tree… we wished we knew what to do, but we didn’t… we asked a local on the square what to do – he shrugged – he didn’t know either… we stayed on watch – if he went too close to the road then we would act – what choice did we have?… we resolved not to leave the square until the sloth was safely in a tree where he belonged…