Destruction Of Nutrias

Nutrias are omnivores they maintain a diet mainly consisting of plant matter. This is bad news to the invaded environment and its occupants. They tend to invade different types of wetlands primarily, and don't mind leaving behind a mess. They do considerable amounts of damage to the ecosystem in which they reside. Nutrias are also notorious for "ravaging" human-grown crops/gardens. I specify the term ravaging because nutrias don't consume nearly as much as they damage. Although, they ideally consume one-fourth of their own body weights every day. That alone illustrates the sheer amount of potential that a single nutria possesses for destruction. Not to mention, the nutria reproduce rapidly, and in some cases live in large colonies. Additionally, they have very little predatorial threats, thereby increasing population growth considerably. Reports of decreasing populations of other species within an ecosystem that nutrias inhabit comes as no surprise. In short, nutrias obliterate a lot of vegetation and only eat little of what they actually salvage. …show more content…
Nutrias were captivated for their furs and also bought/sold to limit the amount of unwanted weeds in ponds and other. Unfortunately, unwanted weeds were not the only thing nutria reduced. Once the demand for fur plummeted, so did the need for the nutria. Subsequently, many of the captivated nutrias were let go into the wild. Where they adapted over time and spread like wildfires throughout the United States. Fast forward to the present and nutrias are still wrecking havoc upon the