December 18, 1995
Web posted at: 8:45 p.m. EST
SEATTLE, Washington (CNN) -- It's a boy -- but it's hard to
tell just by looking. We're talking about a baby sloth at
the Woodland Park Zoo in Seattle.
It takes a veterinary sleuth to determine the sex of a sloth, because their sex organs are in their stomach. Enter Dr. Thomas Hildebrandt of the Smithsonian Institution. The visiting veterinarian used ultrasound technology to solve the mystery.
"Ultrasound has a nice advantage that it¹s not invasive,
and you can make it every week if you want," said Dr.
Hildebrandt.
Now that zoo keepers know the infant sloth is a boy, they can finally name him. There are other important reasons for knowing the sex. "You can get a lot of new information about the reproductive biology and about new diseases," the veterinarian explained.
Since the baby sloth's mother, Coco, already has had 19 offspring, veterinarians decided to give her a hysterectomy. But one look with the ultrasound revealed a surprise -- Coco's 20th offspring.
While they were at it, they performed an ultrasound examination on the father, Brownie. The results brought some bad news-- chronic kidney failure, calcification and some cysts. Veterinarians attribute Brownie's ailments to old age.
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