Nutria

Description

The nutria reaches a body length of up to 65 cm and weighs 8-10 kg as an adult. Its round, scale-covered, barely hairy tail has a length of about 30-45 cm. The animals are thus smaller than adult beavers (maximum snout-vent length about 100 cm, tail length about 35 cm, weight 25-30 kg). On their hind feet they have webbings between the first four toes, the fifth toe is exposed. The orange colouring of the chisel teeth, which is caused by iron deposits, is also conspicuous in adult animals.

The coat colour is reddish brown, slightly greyish on the belly. Animals that have escaped from fur farms also show a number of colour variations. They have light grey, dark grey, black, brown, reddish, yellowish or almost white fur.

Habitat

The original habitat of the nutria, which lives in rivers, lakes, ponds and swamps, is subtropical and temperate South America. In Austria, the population is limited to isolated, usually short-lived populations that regularly do not survive harsh winters. The species is not permanently established there.

The text is a translation of an excerpt from Wikipedia (https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nutria). On wikipedia the text is available under a „Creative Commons Attribution/Share Alike“ licence. Status: 25 August 2021