Affiliation:
1. 3309 Snowbrush Court, Fort Collins, CO 80521, USA
Abstract
Late Pleistocene sloths were widely distributed and present in a diversity of habitats in South, Central, and North America and some Caribbean Islands. Late Pleistocene sloths include 27 genera in four families Megatheriidae, Megalonychidae, Mylodontidae, and Nothrotheriidae. There is no consensus on the number of valid species. Some sloths have wide geographic distributions and are present on multiple continents while others have a much smaller distribution. Our knowledge of the paleoecology and natural history of the different sloths varies greatly depending on their relative abundance. The wide distribution of sloths and adaptations to different habitats results in several “sloth” faunas with different taxonomic compositions. These generalized faunas can be distinguished geographically as Temperate North America (five genera), Southern Mexico and Central America (five genera), Northern South America (two genera), West Coast of South America (four genera), the Andes and Altiplano (four genera), Brazilian Intertropical Region (nine genera), Pampas-Patagonia and the Caribbean Islands (Cuba, Hispaniola, and Puerto Rico, four genera). Some genera may occur in multiple regions but are represented by different species. These regions also have differences in other mammalian taxa, so the sloths are often in ecological competition with different megaherbivores or preyed on by different carnivores.
Subject
Nature and Landscape Conservation,Ecology,Global and Planetary Change
Reference195 articles.
1. Patterson, B.D., and Costa LP, L.B. (2012). Bones, Clones, and Biomes, University of Chicago Press.
2. First Tertiary land mammal from Greater Antilles: An Early Miocene sloth (Xenarthra, Megalonychidae) from Cuba;MacPhee;Am. Mus. Nat. Hist. Novit.,1994
3. The oldest known record of a ground sloth (Mammalia, Xenarthra, Folivora) from Hispaniola: Evolutionary and paleobiogeographical implications;Milan;J. Paleontol.,2022
4. Increased xenarthran diversity during the early stages of the Great American Biotic Interchange: A new genus and species of ground sloth (Mammalia, Xenarthra, Megalonychidae) from the Hemphillian (Late Miocene) of Jalisco, Mexico;McDonald;J. Paleontol.,2017
5. Asynchronous extinction of late Quaternary sloths on continents and islands;Steadman;Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA,2005