Sri Lankan Sloth Bear

              The sloth, also known as the Stickney Bear or labiated bear, is a nocturnal insectivorous species of bear found wild within the Indian subcontinent. The sloth bear evolved from ancestral brown bears during the Pleistocene and shares features found in insect-eating mammals through convergent evolution.Although little is known about the social habits of sloth bears, it is generally assumed that they are solitary animals, except for females with cubs but adults are also known to travel in pairs with the males being gentle with cubs.

              They have  long, shaggy black fur, and have particularly 

long hair around their necks that looks like a mane. They have little fur on their bellies and the insides of their legs. Adult sloth bears usually weigh about 300 pounds, females being somewhat smaller than the males. They are usually 3 feet high at the shoulder and about 6 feet long. Sloth bears have a long muzzle with agile, protruding lips, and nostrils that can be closed when raiding termite mounds.They have a hollowed-out bony palate and no front teeth so they can suck ants and termites out of their nests. 

              Sloth bears are omnivorous and are known to eat a wide variety of different plants, animals, and insects, but prefer termites. They will eat fruit, raid beehives for honey and larvae, while corn, and yams, are also known to be included in a sloth bears diet. Sri Lankan sloth bears are mostly nocturnal, thus the best times to observe them would be early morning and dusk, feeding and traveling by night, and sleeping in the day. They are excellent tree climbers, and are often seen hanging from “palu” a kind of a berry tree, a sloth bears favourite fruit tree in Sri Lanka.