Hey, Wake UP!

I was walking by the newly constructed foot-paddle boat launch area in The Park and saw this sight for the first time... three adult NUTRIAS on land. I see them in water, and I see them chewing reeds, and I see them sometimes on the banks of the lank on the grass, I assume hunting for tasty new green shoots. But I've never seen them stacked up like a bunch of firewood. One woke up and was in the middle of this little grooming thing they do... he's almost finished by the time my camera caught him.




I love it that he is making the same face you might do if you were scratching your underbelly. Cracks me up. I also think it's funny to watch the two duck feathers swimming around in the back ground in the same way the ducks themselves would. A sort of optical illusion (If you can imagine them as two tiny white ducks).

These little guys are so like Beavers in appearance (except for the tail)... I don't know if Beavers also do what you saw him doing, but I did read up that Nutrias regularly rub their hair with their hands to distribute natural oils that help their hair/skin stay protected while they tool around in the water so much. That was the tail end of what you saw him doing... I love how they use their little hands much like ours.

Here, it looks like he wants his pal to wake up, but he's out cold. I really was surprised to see this kind of behavior.



I realize these are not the best videos but I've been so busy I haven't been able to do much more than this. I have some great video of hummingbirds at our CO cabin feeders and many brightly colored birds that came to visit that I hope to load before I go out of town end of this weekend. In the mean time....

I had never seen a Nutria before I moved here, but they are prevalent. Do you have them where you live?