Description: Megalonyx jeffersonii, or the Giant Ground Sloth lived around 12, 190 years ago and would have stood 10.5 feet (3.2 meters) tall and weighed 4,500 pounds (2041 kilograms). The claws were used for digging roots. It was the largest and northern-most species of ground sloth. Giant sloths were common in Indiana and Ohio during the Pleistocene epoch (10,000 to 1.8 million years ago). The species was named in honor of Thomas Jefferson (jeffersonii) who discovered it in Virginia. This sloth is a cast of an original skeleton, which was found in a peat bog in Greenville, Ohio. It was mounted in 1989 by students Timothy Miller (1990), Christina Chambers (1987) and then museum director, John Iverson.

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