Creature Feature: Giant Ground Sloth.

[Guest Nicholas]

Note to members:

I will be initiating a different taxon on "Creature Feature" every week, usually posted on Fridays. Members are highly encouraged to post their fossils, articles, and what have you relating to the particular animal. We're starting the first few months with Mammals, to offer something to the vertebrate enthusiasts. The desire is to build a referencable body of knowledge (over time) on each. Make a note that off topic posts are discouraged.

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Ground sloths are a diverse group of extinct sloths, mammals in the edentate superorder Xenarthra. They may have died out as recently as 1550 AD in Hispaniola and Cuba, but had long since been extinct on the mainland of North and South America. The term "ground sloth" is used as a reference for all extinct sloths because of the large size of the earliest forms discovered, as opposed to the extant "tree sloths." However, this is an historical convention and does not imply that all extinct sloths were strictly terrestrial in nature.

The bulk of ground sloth evolution took place during the mid to late Tertiary of South America while the continent was isolated. At their earliest appearance in the fossil record, the ground sloths are already distinct at the family level. The presence of intervening islands between the American continents in the Miocene allowed a dispersal of forms into North America. A number of mid- to small-sized forms are believed to have previously dispersed to the Antilles islands either by making short swims or using land bridges that are now submerged. Ground sloths were a hearty group as evidenced by their diverse numbers and dispersals into remote areas given the finding of their remains in Patagonia (Seno Ultima Esperanza)[3] and parts of Alaska.

Sloths, and xenarthrans as a whole, represent one of the more successful South American groups during the Great American Biotic Interchange by establishing a number of taxa in the northern continent. Most taxa moved from North American into South America, with very few going the other way. At least five genera of ground sloth are recognized from North America, and mark the successful immigration of ground sloths into that continent.

Fossil range: Oligocene - Holocene

Kingdom: Animalia

Phylum: Chordata

Class: Mammalia

Subclass: Theria

Infraclass: Eutheria

Superorder: Xenarthra

Order: Pilosa

Suborder: Folivora (partim)

Links:

More Wiki Information.

Informational page.

Skeletal Photo.

[Guest Nicholas]

Quick comment of my own:

Sorry I missed last weeks Creature Feature, I have been busy in preparation of going back to University. A lot of messy stuff that took up the majority of my time...

I find the Giant Sloth fascinating, and when I read about it for this creature feature it really opened my eyes to a load of information I didn't know, like these sloths living right up until the Holocene. That amazes me, I thought they were gone way before that. I hope you enjoy this information as much as I have.

Remember I'm taking votes for future Creature Features, so pm me with your ideas. I'm still primarily looking for terrestrial Mammals, Reptiles, and Birds... Perhaps a creature found in the UK or in another part of the world rather than North America... hrmm? Anyway, I hope to hear from you.