The Sloth Institute is particularly special to us, due to their founder. Their founder, Sam, is a huge sloth conversationalist, and devotes her life to saving these beautiful creatures. She actually was the person who educated me on the dangers of sloth tourism and why it is so important that we advocate to keep sloths in the wild! And free!
While the other sanctuaries I discussed are located either in central or on the Caribbean (west) side of Costa Rica, The Sloth Institute is located on the Pacific side (east coast). This sanctuary is located near the national park of Manuel Antonio. This is a protected park, with plenty of cercropia trees (a two fingered sloth's favorite!). Due to this protected land, a lot of the sloths that are rehabilitated, at The Sloth Institute, are released in this park. They are also released here due to minimal human contact, as well as minimal human interference; which include highways and roads, and most importantly a lack of power lines. Second to dog attacks, electrocution is a top contributor to sloth deaths and injuries. This is because humans have built roads and power lines through sloth's homes (the forest), therefore when sloth's go from tree to tree, a lot of times they won't understand that a power line is dangerous. Climbing along the power line to get to a different branch, a lot of times these beautiful creatures are electrocuted. A lot die, some don't. It is heartbreaking.
The Sloth Institute is working to change this! Not only do they take in sloths from all around the country, who have been injured, as well as orphaned baby sloths, but they also work to help insulate power lines.
Note: The Sloth Institute does not offer tours to the outside public, but they do offer a 6 month internship program and volunteering at their sanctuary. You can also virtually adopt one of their adorable sloths. My husband and I adopted Alvin and Merlin.
Fun Fact: We have a fun and amazing story, regarding Alvin. For my 22nd birthday (gosh, 5 years ago already?!), David (my husband) adopted me Alvin, from The Sloth Institute. Alvin is a tiny two fingered sloth that was found without its mother. David and I's favorite city is Savannah, Georgia. We fell in love with it almost a decade ago, and we actually got married in Savannah! When we lived in Florida, we would go all the time, and now that we are in Wisconsin we still go, but wish we could go more (thanks Coronavirus :(, hopefully 2021!). On one of our trips, three years ago, we did a pedal pub tour around Savannah (which I highly recommend). On the pedal pub, we actually became friends with some people, and one of the girls and I got to talking. Her sister loves sloths and actually adopted a baby two fingered named Elvis, from The Sloth Institute! While twins are rare, it does happen that a female sloth will give birth to twins. This was the case for Elvis and Alvin! It turns out Elvis is Alvin's twin brother, and we randomly made friends with a girl whose sister is Elvis's adopter! How cool is that?!
Links:
PC: The Sloth Institute and Sam Trull
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