(COLORADO SPRINGS) — Cheyenne Mountain Zoo (CMZoo) has announced that Bean, their beloved Hoffman’s two-toed sloth, passed away after a short bout with kidney and heart disease on Sept. 24. She was six years old.
Photos courtesy of Cheyenne Mountain Zoo
Photos courtesy of Cheyenne Mountain Zoo
Photos courtesy of Cheyenne Mountain Zoo
Photos courtesy of Cheyenne Mountain Zoo
According to CMZoo, Bean lost her appetite the week prior and was acting “off.” In response, she was sent to the Zoo’s veterinary hospital for supportive treatment and bloodwork, which revealed kidney disease. By Wednesday, Sept. 24, her kidney levels had improved thanks to her care team’s support, but Bean passed away later that evening.
A necropsy the following day, Sept. 25, revealed significant heart disease. CMZoo says that Bean did not present heart-specific symptoms that would lead to heart testing in a sloth her age.
Bean was born in Monkey Pavilion, now the Zoo’s playhills, on May 14, 2019. She was a guest favorite as soon as she was born, allowing people to feed her grapes in her first months.
“Sloths have a reputation for being slow, but Bean was pretty fast when she wanted to be,” Jackie Watson, senior animal keeper in The Loft, says. “I loved when she’d climb right in front of our ‘Welcome to The Loft’ sign, like she was our guests’ official welcome sloth. People would always ask with excitement, ‘Is that sloth real?’ and then we’d get to tell them all about her and her species.”
Benan was not only the first sloth at the zoo in 15 years, but she also knew how to paint. Her keepers attached a paintbrush to a stick so that she could paint one-handed while she hung upside down. Countless CMZoo guests enjoyed painting sessions with Bean, many even buying her artwork to support the zoo’s animal care.
“When she first moved to The Loft, I started training her to paint so we had more opportunities to bond,” said Cassie Spero, another senior animal keeper in The Loft. “A couple of months later, she was swiping a paint brush on canvases, my hands, and often her face. We bonded so much that whenever I was training a skunk, owl, or porcupine, she would wake up, climb to wherever I was, and hang down from the ropes to interrupt my other training sessions. Bean helped shape my career, and I am forever grateful to have had the opportunity to get to know her.”
Bean is survived by her father, Bosco, and her half-sister Olive, who live in the Scutes Family Gallery.
