On June 28th, a sloth named Sid bit a child during an animal encounter at the Charleston Sloth and Exotics facility in South Carolina. While the facility owners claim that they appropriately warned the family of potential dangers by delivering a routine speech before the encounter, the family insists that they were not given proper safety instructions explaining that the sloth could bite or how to pet, feed, and interact with him.
The family was directed to enter the sloth enclosure with fruit pieces. They stated that they were encouraged to feed and pet the animals. Despite multiple warnings from staff indicating that they were too close, Sid suddenly bit the child on the finger down to the bone while being held by the child’s mother, who was taking selfies with the animal. They rushed the child to a local medical facility for treatment of the injury.
According to the USDA, the owners of the exotics facility did not have a proper animal license. Although they claimed that this was the first time Sid had bitten anyone, further research revealed that two other bite incidents occurred at this facility: one from a sloth (unclear if it was also Sid) and another from a kinkajou. Now, the family is suing the facility for failure to operate safely and seeking compensation for the child’s injuries.
Although many wild animal encounter enthusiasts believe that sloths are too slow to attack a human, sloths are capable of inflicting serious damage and should be assumed dangerous like any bigger or faster wild animal. Further, allowing anyone to be in close contact with wild animals, especially young children, puts everyone’s safety at risk – whether or not the facility has a proper wildlife license or gives a safety speech before interactions. Equally important, even the most experienced wildlife professionals often fail to handle wild animals safely, so ensuring that members of the public – especially children – behave in a respectful and safe manner while interacting with wildlife frequently proves impossible.
This incident illustrates the importance of legislation like the Big Cat Public Safety Act and the Captive Primate Safety Act. These bills would greatly restrict public interactions with big cats and primates across the United States, which would hopefully pave the way for other species, such as sloths, to be included in future legislation. Until the use of wild animals in ill-advised public encounters is brought to an end, injury to people, and suffering for the animals involved, will continue.
What will it take for us to decide that viewing wildlife in their natural habitat is enough?
Keep Wildlife in the Wild,
Devan
