Congress approves new weapon in the war to save marshes, a price on a rodent's head
NEW ORLEANS, La., June 2 — A Cajun joke making the rounds over the Internet goes like this. You may be from Louisiana if, you know what a nutria is, but you still use it as your baseball team's mascot. But some folks in Louisiana and Washington are not laughing. Congress recently approved a new weapon in a domestic war, not a new gun, missile or surveillance system to fight terrorism. In the battle to save Louisiana marshes from coastal erosion, the new weapon is a price tag on the tail of this large, burrowing, oversexed rodent from Argentina called nutria, a Spanish word for its scientific, Latin name, Myocastor coypus. Millions of furry nutria with large orange-yellow teeth are eating marsh grass and plants at such an alarming rate Congress approved a $12.5 million to be spent over the next five years to pay hunters and trappers $4 a tail, as proof the swamp rats are dead. Rice and sugar cane farmers, whose crops are also destroyed by nutria, simply call them "nutria rats." They say politics makes strange bedfellows. But in the case of nutria, there is an interesting divide between two natural political allies who are not even speaking to each other on the issue. To environmentalists, nutria are an invasive species with a population of more than 20 million in Louisiana alone — up to 10 per acre — capable of eating enough vegetation to destroy 100,000 acres of wetlands a year. "When nutria overgraze, it's like putting too many cows in a pasture," said Greg Linscombe, a biologist for the Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries' Fur and Refuge Division. "They dig for the roots and eat right down to the dirt. They destroy more than they actually consume." When the tide comes in and out, the earth goes with it. To animal rights activists, on the other hand, the nutria is a cuddly creature on par with the beaver, muskrat or rabbit, and it should be protected. (OK, nutria are not quite as cuddly as rabbits and, to date, there are no successful nutria cartoons, only bad jokes). As recently as the 1980s, the middle class in Russia and Argentina considered nutria coats popular. But don't ask an upper class woman in the French Quarter if that is a nutria coat she is wearing, or she is likely to lash out at you with the back of her hand, or at least her mouth. The nutria fur market died internationally in the late 1980s with the breakup of the old Soviet Union, in part due to a period of mild winters in Europe, anti-fur campaigns by animal rights activists, and the devaluation of the currency in Russia, Argentina and other countries, which made the nutria coats too expensive for the middle class. In one effort to control the population, some of New Orleans' most renowned five star chefs like Paul Prudhomme came up with recipes for cooking and serving nutria meat. Yet let's face it, nutria fettuccine, nutria sausage and nutria gumbo never quite caught on with the persnickety diners of Louisiana or the U.S. Tabasco sauce tycoon E.A. McIlhenny is often blamed for the nutria problem. He imported some nutria from Argentina in the 1930s. A few escaped during hurricanes in 1937 and 1941. Academic research now reveals that McIlhenny was not the only culprit who imported and raised nutria for fur in Louisiana. But since the nutria fur market worked out well for the local economy in those days, he never disputed the story and even reveled in it publicly, which is one reason he still gets the credit, or the blame. McIlhenny maintained nutria in a fenced enclosure on his Avery Island estate in southern Louisiana where imported red peppers and native salt mixed with French white wine vinegar became the basis for a hot concoction that gave New Orleans cuisine its spice. Feeding on the abundant plant life in the Louisiana swamps and waterways, McIlhenny's nutria and other escapees quickly reproduced, creating a market for hunters and trappers, but an ecological disaster for Louisiana wetlands. Nutria reach sexual maturity at six months, and the couples are able to sire two litters of up to five young in a year. Because of their prolific breeding habits, the nutria population spread to Mississippi, Arkansas and Texas, according to the U.S. Geological Survey. They're also a problem in the Chesapeake Bay region around Maryland. Even in its native Argentina, where the middle class prized nutria coats for much of the '70s and '80s and considered it a prime gift for young women when they turned 15, the nutria rat is now considered a national nuisance. "It is a huge plague, and even in Argentina we have to kill them," says Adriana Valdez, a writer and editor from Argentina studying communications at Loyola University New Orleans. In spite of the problems it causes all over the world, there is something about the nutria that inspires humor. One of the funniest books on nutria, she said, is a novel by Manuel Puig called The Buenos Aries Affair. Nutria became such a problem in flood canals around Jefferson Parish in Louisiana a few years back that Sheriff Harry Lee, a 320-pound Chinese-American who is very popular with his people and the press, got about as famous as Buford Pusser of Tennessee when he dispatched a SWAT-team of sharp shooters to take aim at nutria for target practice. In the absence of a real demand for nutria fur and nutria meat today, however, and since there are not enough sharp shooters in Louisiana to get rid of them all, the federal government finally made the decision to step in. According Linscombe, the $12.5 million grant is unique and offers real results. It was approved in mid-April as a project under the Coastal Wetlands Planning Protection and Restoration Act, otherwise known as the Breaux Act after Sen. John Breaux. State agencies are now setting up the infrastructure to implement nutria population control. To hunt or trap them, you will need the written permission of a landowner and a trapping license from the state Wildlife and Fisheries department. The trapping/hunting season will run from late November through March, beginning after the first frost and at a time of year when the vegetation is low enough to spot the dog-sized rodents in the marsh. Another measure passed the U.S. House last week and now goes to the Senate which will provide another $10 million over the next five years in the attempt to kill 400,000 nutria annually and save 15,000 acres of wetlands a year. "Louisiana has the most marsh, the biggest problem as far as wetlands loss, and the most dollars coming here," Linscombe said. "If this is not protection, I don't know what it is. We are trying to avoid loss of marsh because of overgrazing. "It's a lot cheaper to try to avoid losing it than to go back and reestablish it," he said. "There was a lot of support from the public and land owners." Technology is not advanced enough to eradicate nutria by sterilization, he said, and the environmental side effects of chemical poisoning ruled out spraying. Public hearings are planned in the next few months to inform trappers and hunters about the program and to pre-register them. Private contractors will be hired to collect and pay for nutria tails, a $4 incentive to make up for the weak fur market. The logic behind targeting 400,000 nutria a year is based on an estimate of how many it would take to control the population, and figures from the last profitable fur season. During the boom years from the '50s through the '70s, hunters and trappers took about 400,000 a year and the population never got out of control. In 1998, in a mid-'90s spike in demand from the Russian market, hunters and trappers harvested about 360,000 at an average of $5 per nutria pelt. "That was the biggest catch in about 10 years," Linscombe said. "Russia consumed more fur, wild and ranched, than any place in the world." But again in 1999, devaluation of the ruble raised the price of a nutria coat from about $700 (U.S. dollars) to $2100, he said, "destroying the market." Today a pelt goes for about $1, so with the $4 incentive, the hope is there are enough hunters and trappers still interested in going after them to get the job done. And it's a major job. Aerial surveys show at least 20,000 acres of marsh converted to open water in the past decade alone. The monetary incentive is also needed since there's not much sport to hunting nutria. "They're not the most exciting thing to shoot," Linscombe said. "They will run, but you can get right up on 'em." Their lack of physical agility didn't deter the Houston Astros' minor league baseball team in New Orleans, the Zephyrs, from adopting a nutria for a mascot. They call him Boudreaux. Glynn Wilson is a free-lance journalist based in New Orleans. A shorter version of this story first appeared in the Dallas Morning News, Sunday, June 2, 2002 Links Nutria facts from Tulane Nutria recipes Zephyrs Baseball
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