#researchers

Female sloths do not actively search for mates across large territories. Instead, when a female enters estrus, she often advertises her location by making loud vocal calls from the trees.

#Researchers studying wild three toed sloths have recorded these calls attracting nearby males.

Because sloths are usually solitary #animals that spend most of their lives alone, these calls are an efficient way to bring potential mates together in dense rainforest canopies where visibility is limited.

If more than one male responds, competition can occur. Males may confront each other, swipe with their long claws, wrestle, or attempt to push rivals away from the female.

While sloths are famous for moving slowly, males can become surprisingly aggressive during breeding disputes.

Scientists have observed males carrying scars that likely resulted from fights over access to females.

These encounters are among the most intense social interactions seen in an otherwise peaceful species.

The female ultimately decides which male she allows to mate with. In some documented cases, a female has remained near a preferred male for several days before mating. #factstory #azastory #azatell

🦎 Meet the olm — the “dragon” of the underground! 🐉

Deep inside the flooded caves of the Dinaric karst, across #Slovenia, #Croatia, #Bosnia and #Herzegovina, and #Italy, one of the strangest creatures on Earth: the olm (Proteus anguinus) lives. 🌑💧

Unlike most #salamanders, the #olm never grows out of its larval form. It keeps its external gills for life and spends its entire existence underwater. 🫧

Its pale pink skin makes sense in the darkness — there’s almost no need for pigment underground. Its eyes are undeveloped and covered by skin, making it effectively blind. Instead, it relies on smell, water movement, and even weak electrical signals to navigate. 👁️❌⚡

After heavy rains, floods sometimes wash olms out of their caves. Local people once believed these mysterious creatures were baby #dragons emerging from the mountains. 🐉⛰️

But perhaps the strangest thing about the olm is how little it needs to survive. 🍽️

With almost no food available in cave waters, it has evolved an incredibly slow metabolism. It can survive years without eating, with laboratory observations reporting survival for up to a decade. 😳

And it takes “slow living” to another level. A long-term study recorded one olm remaining in essentially the same position for 2,569 consecutive days — nearly 7 years! 💤

#Researchers describe its lifestyle as being almost entirely about doing nothing. 😂

Some estimates suggest olms can live for around 100 years, making them remarkably long-lived amphibians. 🕯️

🇸🇮 Slovenia has even featured the olm on a coin. The species is protected, but its underground habitat faces growing threats from groundwater #pollution. 💧⚠️

A blind, ancient, pink “dragon” that can barely move and can survive years without food — nature is unbelievable. #storybee #viralstory #viral #todaystory #azatellng