Megatherium
Megatherium americanum
Megatherium shows that relatives of small tree-dwelling sloths could evolve into enormous land mammals in South America.
Image: en:User:Ballista · CC BY-SA 3.0 · Wikimedia Commons
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Sites on today's globe · 1 marker
Characteristics
- Scientific name
- Megatherium americanum
- Period
- Late Pleistocene
- Lived
- 0.1–0.008 Ma (100,000 years ago)
- Diet
- Herbivore
- Habitat
- Plains, Forest
- Length (estimate)
- 6 m
- Mass (estimate)
- 4,000 kg
Description
Megatherium was a giant ground sloth with long forelimbs, large claws and a heavy tail. It could probably stand on its hind legs and pull branches towards itself to eat leaves. Its powerful claws were not only tools for digging but could also have been used in defence. Its precise diet and the extent to which it stood upright are matters of reconstruction.
Habitat
Open grasslands, woodland edges and river areas of South America.
Fossil sites
Luján, Buenos Aires Province
Cultural profile: Argentina →
Contemporaries in the database
Sources: Megatherium