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Black howling monkey, Black-and-gold howler monkey

The Black howler monkey exhibits a noticeably big neck and lower jaw with huge vocal cords. The largest New World monkey, this primate is also the largest monkey in rainforests of Latin America. This species has a well-defined sexual dimorphism with females, being smaller and displaying buff overall coloration. Additionally, newborn babies of this species also have buff fur. Another characteristic feature of these monkeys is their prehensile tails, acting as a 'fifth limb', allowing them to grip and hang from tree branches. Being arboreal animals, the Black howler monkeys spend majority of their time high in the trees, using their gripping tails quite often. Their diet mainly consists of various leaves, found aloft.

Photos with Black Howler Monkey

Mating Habits

Fun Facts for Kids

These primates emit their characteristic howling calls through the special and very large voice box.

Allomothering is a common activity in Black howler monkeys. This is when females of a group display communal care to each other's infants, carrying, grooming and protecting the babies.

As much as 70% of each day is spent resting while leaves ferment in their large ceacums.

The species of their genus are among the biggest New World monkeys. They consume the largest amounts of leaves, as compared to all other New World monkeys. However, howlers don't have specialized stomachs.

Howler monkeys are also known for emitting the loudest call of all primates in the world, which they do by a special, egg-shaped hyoid bone.

The Black howler monkeys have a well-developed sense of smell. These animals are able to smell food from as far as 2 km.

More Fascinating Animals to Learn About

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Black howling monkey, Black-and-gold howler monkey The Black howler monkey exhibits a noticeably big neck and lower jaw with huge vocal cords. The largest New World monkey, this primate is also the largest monkey in rainforests of Latin America. This species has a well-defined sexual dimorphism with females, being smaller and displaying buff overall coloration.

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Distribution

Jaguars are widely distributed, inhabiting New Mexico and southern Arizona south toward northeastern Brazil and northern Argentina. Populations have been drastically reduced or in some areas and even eliminated, including the United States, El Salvador, and large parts of Mexico. Jaguars like thick, moist tropical lowland forests with plenty of cover, but can be found in reed thickets, scrubland, coastal forests, thickets and swamps. They are superb swimmers and are usually found living near water: rivers, slow moving streams, watercourses, lagoons, and swamps.

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Jaguars are widely distributed, inhabiting New Mexico and southern Arizona south toward northeastern Brazil and northern Argentina. Populations have been drastically reduced or in some areas and even eliminated, including the United States, El Salvador, and large parts of Mexico.

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Brown-throated sloth

The slowest mammal in the world, the Brown-throated three-toed sloth is an unusual animal. The word 'sloth' means slow. And indeed, this sluggish animal is so sedentary that algae appear on its fur. Brown-throated three-toed sloths are endemic to rainforest canopies of Central and South America. Due to hanging onto branches with their long claws, they are able to consume leaves, located too high for other animals to reach. On the other hand, these long claws create difficulties as they walk on the ground. Hence, the Brown-throated three-toed sloths are mostly arboreal, living in trees.

Photos with Brown-Throated Three-Toed Sloth

Distribution

Geography

Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Panama, Peru, Venezuela, Show More Argentina Show Less

These sloths occur in tropical and semi-deciduous forests as well as subtropical lowlands and swamps of South America and southern Central America (Bolivia, Brazil, Colombia, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Honduras, Nicaragua, Panama, Peru, Venezuela).

Habits and Lifestyle

Brown-throated sloths usually have very short periods of activity between long periods of sleep. As a general rule, they sleep about 15-18 hours per day and can be active during both day and night. Adult Brown-throated sloths display solitary behavior and socialize extremely rarely: two adult sloths have never been seen together in the same tree. Fighting does not appear to occur between individuals, but they are known to protect their territories, food, and other property. During most of the day, sloths can be seen sitting in the forks of tree branches or hanging from branches in the middle layer and top of trees. They thermoregulate their bodies due to living in trees with exposure to the sun: when it gets cold, these animals exposure to the sun; during hot weather, they descent to find shelter in branches. Brown-throated sloths cannot walk and stand, hence they move onto the ground by propelling themselves with their forelegs.

Diet and Nutrition

Brown-throated sloths are herbivores (folivores and frugivores). Theyhey mainly feed upon leaves, flowers, fruits and other parts of tree.

Mating Habits

In the past, these animals were believed to be monogamous, although it's not exactly true: they are solitary and males leave soon after mating without taking part in raising offspring, suggesting that Brown-throated sloths are either polygynous or polygynandrous (promiscuous). Females give out calls in order to attract males. As a response to the call, male sloths engage in fights, and the winner mates with the female. Populations in South America mate from July to November, while these in Central America mate in February-May. The females do not construct any nests. The gestation period lasts for 5-8 months, yielding a single baby. The young sloth is completely weaned at 4-5 weeks old but remains attached to its mother for the first 5-10 months of its life. Reproductive maturity is reached at 3-5 years of age in males, and at 3 years in females.

Population

Population threats

Although there are no obvious threats to this species on the whole, some subpopulations in Colombia and the Atlantic Forest (Brazil) greatly suffer from deforestation, which causes degradation and fragmentation of their natural habitat. In some parts of their range, the Brown-throated sloths are hunted by local indigenous people. In Columbia, some individuals (primarily - infants) are threatened by the illegal pet trade, being caught and sold as pets to tourists. This leads to population decline and poses a serious danger to this species in the wild.

Population number

According to IUCN, the Brown-throated sloth is widespread throughout its range but no overall population estimate is available. These animals are classified as Least Concern (LC) on the IUCN Red List.

Fun Facts for Kids

The long and coarse fur of this animal is normally light brown, though may seem to be green because of the blue-green algae, growing there.

At a few weeks old, infant sloths get algae colonies into their fur from their mothers. Algae, growing on their fur, do not occur anywhere else. These animals allow algae to live in their fur, providing it with the required moisture. Algae, in turn, serve as camouflage, helping them escape predators.

Males of this species are identified by a bright yellow or orange-colored marking between their shoulders. In this patch, they possess scent-marking glands, which are used to attract receptive females.

These sloths practice two types of resting: "awake-alert" - this is when they rest with open eyes and blink; and "behavioral sleep" - this is when they are suspended from a tree with their eyes closed.

These accomplished swimmers drop themselves off branches into rivers to swim. They are known to use breaststroke style, just like humans.

Muscles make up only 25% of a sloth's body. So when it's cold, the animal cannot shiver in order to warm up.

Due to the specific shape of its mouth, the Brown-throated sloth seems to smile constantly. The flexible head of this animal can rotate up to 90 degrees.

The female of the species emits a loud, shrill scream during the mating season to attract males. Its cry sounds like "ay ay", much like that of a woman screaming.

More Fascinating Animals to Learn About

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Brown-throated sloth The slowest mammal in the world, the Brown-throated three-toed sloth is an unusual animal. The word 'sloth' means slow. And indeed, this sluggish animal is so sedentary that algae appear on its fur. Brown-throated three-toed sloths are endemic to rainforest canopies of Central and South America.

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The Common vampire bat is a small, leaf-nosed bat native to Latin America. It is short-haired, with silver-gray fur on its undersides, demarcated from the darker fur on its back. A well-developed, clawed thumb on each wing is used to climb onto prey and to assist the animal in take-off. The Common vampire bat practices hematophagy, mainly feeding on the blood of livestock. The bat usually approaches its prey at night while they are sleeping. It then uses its razor-sharp teeth to cut open the skin of its hosts and lap up their blood with its long tongue. Because it feeds on livestock and is a carrier of rabies, the Common vampire bat is considered a pest.

Photos with Common Vampire Bat

Distribution

Geography

Argentina, Belize, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Ecuador, El Salvador, Guatemala, Show More Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Trinidad and Tobago, Uruguay, Venezuela Show Less

Common vampire bats are found in parts of Mexico, Central America, and South America. They prefer warm and humid climates and use tropical and subtropical woodlands and open grasslands for foraging. Bats roost in trees, caves, abandoned buildings, old wells, and mines.

Habits and Lifestyle

Vampire bats live in colonies and have a number of cooperative behaviors such as social grooming and food sharing. Colony numbers can range from single digits to hundreds in roosting sites. The basic social structure of roosting bats is made of female groups and their offspring, a few adult males, known as "resident males", and a separate group of males, known as "nonresident males". Common vampire bats will also roost with about 45 other bat species and are usually the most dominant at roosting sites. They occupy the darkest and highest places in the roosts; when they leave, other bat species move in to take over these vacated spots. Vampire bats hunt at night, using echolocation and olfaction to track down prey. They feed in a distance of 5 to 8 km (3.1 to 5.0 mi) from their roosts. When a bat selects a target, it lands on it, or jumps up onto it from the ground, usually targeting the rump, flank, or neck of its prey; heat sensors in the nose help it to detect blood vessels near the surface of the skin. It pierces the animal's skin with its teeth, biting away a small flap, and laps up the blood with its tongue, which has lateral grooves adapted to this purpose. Common vampire bats are protective of their host and will fend off other bats while feeding and only mothers and their offspring may feed on the same host.

Diet and Nutrition

Common vampire bats are carnivores and feed primarily on mammalian blood, particularly that of livestock such as cattle and horses. They feed on wild prey like the tapir but seem to prefer domesticated animals, and favor horses over cattle when given the choice.

Mating Habits

Common vampire bats are highly polygynous, and dominant adult males defend groups of females. They may breed year-round, although the number of births peaks in the rainy season. Females give birth to one offspring per pregnancy, following a gestation period of about 7 months. The young are raised primarily by females. Mothers leave their young to hunt and call their young to feed upon returning. The young accompany their mothers to hunt at 6 months but are not fully weaned until 9 months. Female offspring usually remain in their natal groups into adulthood, unless their mothers die or move. The occasional movements of unrelated females between groups lead to the formation of multiple matrilines within groups. Male offspring tend to live in their natal groups until they are 1 to 2 years old, sometimes being forced out by the resident adult males. Common vampire bats reach reproductive maturity when they are 9-10 months old.

Population

Population threats

There are no major threats facing Common vampire bats at present.

Population number

According to IUCN, the Common vampire bat is locally common and widespread throughout its range but no overall population estimate is available. Currently, this species is classified as Least Concern (LC) on the IUCN Red List and its numbers today are stable.

Fun Facts for Kids

Common vampire bats have good eyesight. They are able to distinguish different optical patterns and may use vision for long-range orientation.

Common viper bats also have well-developed senses of smell and hearing. They emit echolocation signals orally and thus fly with their mouths open for navigation. They can identify a metal strip 1 centimeter (0.39 in) wide at a distance of 50 centimeters (20 in).

Vampire bats participate in an interesting behavior called mutual grooming. It is when two bats groom each other simultaneously to clean one another, and to strengthen social bonds. Bats that groom one another also share food. It was suggested that while grooming, a bat might assess the size of its partner's abdomen to determine if it really needs to eat.

While most other bats have almost completely lost the ability to maneuver on land, vampire bats are an exception. They can run using a unique, bounding gait in which the forelimbs are used instead of the hindlimbs to propel forward, as the wings are much more powerful than the legs. Three pads under the thumb function like a sole.

Viper bats are bale to leap in various directions, heights, and distances. When making a jump, the bat pushes up with its pectoral limbs.

Vampire bats' saliva has unique properties; it contains an anticoagulant that keeps blood from clotting.

More Fascinating Animals to Learn About

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The Common vampire bat is a small, leaf-nosed bat native to Latin America. It is short-haired, with silver-gray fur on its undersides, demarcated from the darker fur on its back. A well-developed, clawed thumb on each wing is used to climb onto prey and to assist the animal in take-off.

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Green anaconda, Common ana conda, Water anaconda

Anaconda or "Green Nconda" belongs to the boa family and is one of the biggest existing snakes. Like all boas, it is a non-venomous constrictor. Anaconda's females are much bigger in size than males and have clearly marked sexual dimorphism. Anacondas are mainly olive-green with black spots all around their bodies. Anaconda's head has clearly expressed orange-yellow stripes on both sides and is narrow for its body size. The eyes, located on the top of the head, help anacondas observe the surroundings without coming out of the water.

Distribution

Geography

Anacondas' major habitat is Latin America's tropical flatlands. The anacondas are most frequently found in basins of the Amazon River (Brazil), Orinoco River (Columbia), and Los Llanos (Venezuela) - vast tropical grassland plain. They are semi-aquatic animals, living partly on land and partly in the water. Anacondas prefer plains, rainforests, savannas, freshwater areas as well as areas where the water is not very deep.

Habits and Lifestyle

Anacondas are nocturnal creatures and lead a solitary lifestyle. Being water-dwelling reptiles, anacondas are fast in the water while slow on land. Most of their lives they spend in the water, staying underwater for long periods. Anacondas are comparably passive in daytime heat and start moving at dusk when the heat subsides. They often pass long distances very quickly, usually when the dry season reaches its highest point or when they look for mates.

Diet and Nutrition

Anacondas are opportunistic apex predators, which means that they usually don't have any general plan and take advantage of any chance to have a tasty meal. They usually feed on other reptiles, sheep, dogs, tapirs, fish, birds, wild pigs, deer, and rodents as well as any kind of available prey that they are able to catch and swallow.

Mating Habits

These anacondas are polyandrous animals, meaning that a female mates with more than one male while each male mates with only one female. Anacondas mate during the dry season, which is from March to May. Usually, the process of mating lasts up to several weeks. Females don't eat during the gestation period, lasting about seven months. For this reason, after mating, a female can eat her partner to go through this long period. Female anacondas are ovoviviparous. After the incubation period, lasting 7 months, a female gives birth to up to 82 young (though the average number is 20-40). Newborn youngsters are entirely independent: they don't get any protection and care from their mother and have to be able to fend for themselves. Reproductive maturity is reached at the age of about 3 or 4 years.

Population

Population threats

As always, the major threats have to do with human activity. In this case, it's the trade of exotic species. Anacondas are included in Appendix II of CITES (Convention on Trade in International Species). Anacondas are hunted and killed for their skin having huge demand on the black market. They are also persecuted in human settlements as a danger to humans and domestic animals. Anacondas are also threatened by illegal deforestation on account of the carelessness of the local authorities. This brings anacondas to habitat loss even in protected areas.

Population number

The IUCN Red List and other sources don't provide the number of the anaconda total population size. Currently, this species is classified as Least Concern (LC) on the IUCN Red List.

Ecological niche

Being predators, anacondas feed upon a wide variety of vertebrate animals. Young anacondas, in turn, become prey for larger predators.

Fun Facts for Kids

The word "anaconda" has Tamil origins, coming from Tamil word "anaikolra", meaning "elephant killer." After the Spanish conquest of the area, settlers called anacondas "matatoros", which means "bull killers."

After long periods in the water, anacondas are frequently seen hanging from trees to dry up.

Anacondas don't have scales in their cloacas. Their glands in this area smell like musk, which frighten tiny organisms, poisonous to them. So, this smell, most likely, protects anacondas' cloacas from leeches and ticks.

In Latin, the scientific name of anaconda sound like "eunectes murinus" and means "good swimmer".

Anacondas can do without air underwater for about ten minutes and then rise to the surface to get some air.

An anaconda can be satisfied with only one meal over a long period of time, provided that the prey is large enough.

More Fascinating Animals to Learn About

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Green anaconda, Common ana conda, Water anaconda Anaconda or "Green Nconda" belongs to the boa family and is one of the biggest existing snakes. Like all boas, it is a non-venomous constrictor. Anaconda's females are much bigger in size than males and have clearly marked sexual dimorphism.

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Howler monkeys are considered to be one of the noisiest land animals in the world - their calls can be heard 3 miles away!

They live in the rainforests of South America and are pretty lazy - in fact they spend 80% of their time taking it easy - looks like the rest of their time is spent howling - and eating!

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Howler monkeys are considered to be one of the noisiest land animals in the world - their calls can be heard 3 miles away! They live in the rainforests of South America and are pretty lazy - in fact they spend 80% of their time taking it easy - looks like the rest of their time is spent howling - and eating!

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An intimate portrait of animals raising families in a spectacular yet perilous country.

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8. Sloths can fall 100 feet without injury

Sloths are anatomically designed to fall out of trees. On average, a sloth will fall out of a tree once a week for its entire life. But don't worry, all sloths are anatomically designed to fall and survive - they can plummet from over 100 feet without injury (that's the height of twelve double-decker buses). When two sloths fight it is typically over access to a female for mating, and the aim of a sloth fight is to knock your opponent out of the tree.

9. They could cure cancer

Sloths have an unusual method of camouflage - cracks in their hair allow many different species of algae and fungi to grow which makes them appear green. Some species of fungi living in sloth fur have been found to be active against certain strains of bacteria, cancer and parasites! Sloth hair also provides home to an entire ecosystem of invertebrates ⁠- some species of which are found nowhere else on earth (like the 'sloth moth'). A single sloth can host up to 950 moths and beetles within its fur at once.

10. No one knows how long they live for

Because sloths are so difficult to study in the wild, no one has ever followed an individual from birth until death and it is virtually impossible to accurately determine the age of an adult sloth. All we have to go on is the lifespan in captivity, but sloths do not do well outside of their natural environment. The oldest known sloth in the world just turned 50 years old and she lives at a zoo in Germany. We suspect that wild sloths actually live for much longer than this, but only time will tell.

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BBC Radio 4 - Radio 4 in Four - 10 incredible facts about the sloth

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Sloths are anatomically designed to fall out of trees. On average, a sloth will fall out of a tree once a week for its entire life. But don't worry, all sloths are anatomically designed to fall and survive - they can plummet from over 100 feet without injury (that's the height of twelve double-decker buses).

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Vampire bats make the best of friends - CBBC Newsround

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It turns out vampire bats are really good buddies! New research shows they help each other out in times of need.

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The huge rainforest, which is over 24 times the size of the UK, is home to thousands of plants and wildlife species. According to the World Wildlife Fund (WWF), the total known number of species in the rainforest includes: 427 mammals, 1300 birds, 378 reptiles, over 400 amphibians and between 2,500 - 3,000 freshwater fish. These numbers are nothing compared to the number of smaller life forms. In Brazil alone, more than 100,000 invertebrate species have been described by scientists. This abundance of wildlife is largely due to its warm, but liveable temperatures, plentiful of prey, and various ecosystems for wildlife to live in.

Running through the rainforest in the northern portion of South America is the Amazon river. Although it's disputed if the Amazon is the longest river in the world, it does carry more water than the world's next seven biggest rivers combined. Scientists think the river originates in the Andes Mountains of Peru. It travels from west to east through Ecuador, Colombia, Venezuela, Bolivia and Brazil before emptying in the Atlantic Ocean. Although it's very hard to say precisely where the Amazon starts and ends, scientists believe it is at least 6,400 km (4,000 mi) long.

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South America: Rainforests, rivers and waterfalls

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The huge rainforest, which is over 24 times the size of the UK, is home to thousands of plants and wildlife species. According to the World Wildlife Fund (WWF), the total known number of species in the rainforest includes: 427 mammals, 1300 birds, 378 reptiles, over 400 amphibians and between 2,500 - 3,000 freshwater fish.

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Britannica's new platform provides content designed and written specifically for early learners.
Creating a more engaging and fun learning experience for students, the activities in Britannica Fundamentals align with the content areas children learn in the classroom. From language and literacy to geography and mathematics, Britannica Fundamentals supports classroom curriculum while also building digital literacy.

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From Britannica, an online encyclopedia resource for kids in grades K-12 with safe, fact-checked, age-appropriate content for homework help and learning...