We all enjoy sleeping. It's the time for dreaming, replenishing our energy, the time for our brains to literally flush themselves clean of built up waste. As humans, we sleep on average between 7 and 10 hours a day. This is because we have things to do, responsibilities to keep and people to please. When our heads finally hit our pillows, we're usually exhausted.
Not these animals, though! These guys know how to take care of themselves, some more than others. We humans can be pretty lazy, but we're nothing compared to these sleepy souls of the animal kingdom.
Lion
Sleeps 18 - 20 hours a day
This so called king of the jungle is more of a laissez-faire ruler. He sleeps in the shade of trees and leaves his kingdom to it's own devices. Seems to work better than the human world doesn't it? Maybe if we slept more like this guy, we'd have less time to screw everything up!
Koala
Sleeps 16 - 22 hours a day
After a fiber heavy diet of nommy eucalyptus leaves, this fuzzy little friend passes out for 75% of the day. He doses in between the branches of his favorite tree and dreams of never having to make a quick escape.
Squirrel
Sleeps 12 - 21 hours a day
We see squirrels out all the time don't we? Students at every college campus ought to know this. But in reality, there are so many more that we don't see. This is because they are the second laziest animal on this list. After they go scrounging for nuts and berries, they conk out and sleep in their nests of twigs, leaves, furs and feathers for nearly all of the day.
Hippo
Sleeps 16 - 20 hours a day
This fat guy in the picture above is an odd soul. He is sleeping alone, which is kind of strange since hippos snooze in groups of 30 or more! They can sleep on land and underwater. And when they do it underwater, they rise for air automatically without having to wake up!
Giant Panda
Sleeps 10 - 14 hours a day
While other bears are out fishing for salmon or seals, or scooping honey out of a beehive, this black and white, lazy excuse spends his day foraging and feasting on bamboo, and then slings himself over the limb of a tall tree where he goes beddy-byes away from dangerous predators.
Sloth
Sleeps 15 - 20 hours a day
Often cited as the laziest of all of the world's animals, the sloth, as seen in previous entries on this list, is not in fact prone to sleep the most! These lethargic creatures move incredibly slowly to conserve as much energy as possible, and find leisure in hanging upside down from tree branches.
Brown Bat
Sleeps 18 - 20 hours a day
These little critters have a hard time finding food during the regular day. Because of this inconvenience, brown bats fill most of their days with sleep to conserve their energy. They also hibernate and take one long 6 month snooze every year.
Pig
Sleeps 12 - 15 hours a day
When pigs sleep, they tend to snuggle side by side to show just how much they love each other. Pigs are actually very sensitive creatures, and they often get upset when they're called dirty, fat or gross. They touch snouts in their sleep to make sure their companions are still around, and are known to dream like humans and dogs.
Lemur
Sleeps 15 - 17 hours a day
These furry monkeys are very independent beings, and carry on with most of their day alone, being quite content with nothing more than their own concerns. But at night, when the sun goes down and it's frightening to be solitary in the deep dark jungle, lemurs will cuddle together in groups.
Armadillo
Sleeps 18 - 19 hours a day
As nocturnal as one can be without actually being so, armadillos are most active during the evenings, say 6 to 8 pm. But as soon as they're done eating, they go right back to snoozles. Scientists have no idea why they are so sleepy all the time.
Tree Frog (Unclear)
Sleeps ... we don't actually know.
What we do know, though, is that these tiny green fellows almost never move and look like their eyes are permanently shut. How tires this little guy looks!
