Sloths are some of the most adorable creatures. With their gentle, docile demeanor, they just plod along without much care in the world. Though we see most sloths on land, ancient giant sloths have been found to be great swimmers.
Eli Amson, a paleontologist at the Museum für Naturkunde in Berlin, Germany, is one of the researchers who undertook this osteological revision. After reexamining the fossils, Amson and his team found that Thalassocnus was more at home in the water than previously thought. Some of the changes seen through a succession of five distinct Thalassocnus species are similar to those observed in cetaceans as they evolved to life in the sea.
(Image credit: Wikimedia Commons)
