Comments | urbpan: 365 Urban Species. #117: Muskrat

urbpan

365 Urban Species. #117: Muskrat

Apr 27, 2006 22:57

( Read more... )

365 urban species, mammals, animals, muskrat

Comments 15

badnoodles April 28 2006, 03:10:32 UTC

Might want to put the text before the LJ-cut for those of us who don't always click to see cottonmanifesto's lovely pictures. :)

I've never been fortunate enough to live in an area with appreciable mammalian aquatic life - Texas has too many water moccasins, and California doesn't appear to have running water.

bunrab April 28 2006, 03:42:46 UTC

Texas has nutria - Lake Austin and Lake Travis have so many nutria that the water moccasins don't really make a dent in them. The power of rodents!

badnoodles April 28 2006, 03:49:29 UTC

Really? Interesting. I'm a Houstonian, so I never got out to Lake Austin or Lake Travis - most of my aquatic forays were into the creek bottoms of East Texas or safely ensconced on a fishing boat on lake Conroe or Brownwood. :)

bunrab April 28 2006, 03:56:53 UTC

I dunno about Lake Conroe, but nutria are in all the lakes that are along the Lower Colorado River, as far as I know, including all the way east to at least Katy.

Thread 5

bunrab April 28 2006, 03:41:40 UTC

Quibble: the muskrat is a nutria, not a vole. Originally native to South America, but now widespread over much of North America, and a downright problem in the southern US; in cities like Austin, and anywhere along the gulf coast, especially Louisiana, muskrats/nutria are great despoilers of trees, gardens, yards, etc. (Nutria live all over Town Lake, the lake/river impound which the Bat Bridge goes over. So of course, I have gotten to know more about nutria than any sane person wants to know. Also, since they are related to my beloved guinea pigs, I wind up knowing a bit more...)

urbpan April 28 2006, 10:27:48 UTC

Mistaken identity! I did want to add clarifying comments about nutria, but I forgot due to the late hour of posting. Thanks for waking me up. New paragraph makes the distinction.

bunrab April 28 2006, 19:22:19 UTC

Thanks! Should I erase my comment? I was posting late at night, too (that 11:41 timestamp is not accurate; I've never figured out why my selection of time zone has always produced the wrong time), and in daylight I am afraid it sounded like harsh criticism, which is NOT what I intended. I know that you know way more about these critters than I do.

Is that Susie or Sam? brush_rat April 28 2006, 05:59:56 UTC

Did whirl and twirl and tango while Singin' and jinglin' a jangle? Did it float like the heavens above?

So, they aren't even proper rats? How disappointing.

ninthraven April 28 2006, 12:21:07 UTC

cottonmanifesto takes really great nature photos. I am always amazed how she captures the details so clearly.

cottonmanifesto April 28 2006, 19:44:58 UTC

I blushed when I read that. Thank you so much!

bunrab April 28 2006, 19:26:07 UTC

When my mom first moved to Austin, in the early 90's, she called me up excitedly a few days after she moved into the apartment I had found her, which was near a creek, to report that she had seen an otter, and enjoyed watching it frolic. She was heartbroken when I told her she had seen a rodent, not an otter, and all my descriptions of how fascinating the whole ecology of nutria were, and how they fit into the general picture of South American rodents, from cavies to capybaras, did not console her. People have that reaction to rodents. If something is a rodent it's somehow no longer cute. Sheesh. Anyway, that's why your paragraph about people reporting otters immediately brought nutria to mind - 'cause that's what people think they're seeing in Austin.