This Sloth and Moth Relationship Stinks

A symbiotic partnership that benefits both sides.

Howdy! It’s Joey, back with more Fun Fact Friyay. This fact might be a little slow to digest.

Photo by Javier Mazzeo on Unsplash

A sloth moth inhabits the fur of sloths and lays eggs in the sloth’s dung. When the moths are born, they eat the feces before returning to the sloths’ fur for their adult lives.

At some point in your life, you’ve likely smiled at the sight of a sloth. Perhaps not in person—maybe you just saw a video or photo like the one above, or you really enjoyed that scene from Zootopia.

But sloths hide a secret deep within themselves. Or, at least, within their fur. Wild three-toed sloths tend to go to the bathroom approximately every week, and they always do it in the same spot.

That’s good news for the moths that live within their fur. These moths are coprophagous—a fancy word for something that eats feces.

Female moths depart the safety of the fur and head to the feces to lay eggs. When the larvae are born, they subsist on the feces during their early lives.

After that initial stage, the moths return to the sloth. There, they get protection from birds and gain nutrients from the sloth’s skin and symbiotic algae within the fur.

What do the sloths get out of this relationship? I don’t know. Maybe a bunch of moths is a nice tickle on their skin?

Still, it’s very nice of them to host—there are records of more than 120 moths nestled in a single sloth’s fur. That’s what we call carrying the team on your back.