Nutria Damage Coastal Wetlands
The nutria, a rodent found in the coastal wetlands of Louisiana, are known for eating marsh grass and contributing to the loss of coastal wetlands. In recent decades, the nutria have eaten their way through hundreds of square miles of coastal wetlands.
The state of Louisiana began trying to control the nutria population in 2002 by offering a $5 per tail bounty for killing the rodent. The nutria was introduced into the Louisiana wetlands from South America in the 1930's. The 20 nutria brought to Louisiana in the 1930's bred an estimated 20 million animals within two decades.
For many years, this resulted in a profitable fur trade. In the 1960's and 1970's, trappers collected more than 1 million nutria pelts per year. In 1976 alone, trappers collected more than 1.8 million nutria pelts in Louisiana.
In the 1980's and thereafter, fur's popularity declined and the value of a nutria pelt fell from around $10 to about $1. This led to trapper's leaving the business and an explosion in the nutria population. By 2001, the nutria were damaging 81,000 acres a year of wetlands in Louisiana. Since the state bounty was placed on the nutria, the damage has declined to about 34,665 acres in 2007.
For more information on the nutria in Louisiana's wetlands, see the news article in the New Orleans Times Picayune published on February 25, 2008 entitled, Nutria Nation: marsh-eating critter rebounds in post-Katrina.
Erich P Rapp.
