Why do giant animals like whales, giraffes, and elephants need so little sleep compared to small animals likes bats and koalas who need to sleep most of the time. Wouldn’t a larger body need more sleep to recover?
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There is no real size correlation. Lions sleep a lot, goats very little, ants sleep at most a minute per day.
How much sleep is necessary depends on activity, diet, a bunch of physiological processes and most importantly the enviroment! Many animals sleep to conserve energy when there isn’t a lot of food available anyways, while others are forced to migrate large distances to get enough food.
Elephants can’t afford to sleep a lot because they basically need to eat or travel 24/7 to get their needed calories, while Koalas have a diet that is hard to digest, so their only chance for survival is spending as little energy as possible.
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