I Got Rat Class And I Got Rat Style
My best friend, he shoots water rats
And feeds them to his geese
That’s a line from “Live With Me”, a cut from of The Rolling Stones’ Let It Bleed LP. Let It Bleed is one of the better albums by one of the better rock bands ever, and “Live With Me” is proof of a couple of things: a.) Even the Stones’ “throwaways” could be great, and b.) as opposed to their American cousins, English geese are apparently carnivorous, which is kind of scary to think about.
All of which is a roundabout way of getting to nutria rats, which I found myself in a discussion about yesterday. Which got me to thinking about them a little bit.
And feeds them to his geese
That’s a line from “Live With Me”, a cut from of The Rolling Stones’ Let It Bleed LP. Let It Bleed is one of the better albums by one of the better rock bands ever, and “Live With Me” is proof of a couple of things: a.) Even the Stones’ “throwaways” could be great, and b.) as opposed to their American cousins, English geese are apparently carnivorous, which is kind of scary to think about.
All of which is a roundabout way of getting to nutria rats, which I found myself in a discussion about yesterday. Which got me to thinking about them a little bit.
For anyone who doesn’t know – and I don’t know how anyone who has lived around here for very long could not – the nutria (Myocastor coypus) is a large, aquatic, beaver-type rodent who inhabits the bayous and marshes in this area. Nutria are native to South America, but were introduced here in the 1940s because of their reputation as voracious consumers of water hyacinth, a pleasant sounding but nasty plant that, in dry times, proliferates and chokes local marshes, bayous, and canals. Interestingly, it turns out the water hyacinth (Eichhornia crassipes) is a South American native introduced to this area, too. So naturally enough, nutria were brought into control it. Another fine example of man screwing with the natural environment.
What no one knew (or thought about) when importing nutria is that, first of all, they have no natural predators here; and also, when not consuming water hyacinth they apparently spend most of their time, well, doin’ it (scientific term.) Now there are gazillions of nutria rats in Southeast Texas, and the water hyacinth still clogs local waterways in drought times (like now.)
The thing about nutria is, for one thing, they are kind of nasty. They are roughly the size of a mid-sized dog, have oily fur, red eyes, and big orange-yellow teeth. They have a reputation for nasty behavior, as well. Most of the stories I have heard happened when someone unknowingly cornered a nutria rat, often near a nest; and actually, most mammals, including humans, are pretty mean and protective in a situation like that. One person I know, who lives near a branch of the LNVA irrigation canal, tells a great story about inadvertently cornering a nutria on his screened-in back porch one night. The cartoon-ish encounter ended with the nutria calmly exiting the porch through the screen door – through it, literally – while my friend, frantic and armed with a straw broom, the only reasonable facsimile of a defensive weapon available to him at the time, cowered on top of his patio table.
As I have mentioned before, I used to duck hunt in my youth, and most of my experiences rubbing shoulders with our friend the nutria came from back then.
What no one knew (or thought about) when importing nutria is that, first of all, they have no natural predators here; and also, when not consuming water hyacinth they apparently spend most of their time, well, doin’ it (scientific term.) Now there are gazillions of nutria rats in Southeast Texas, and the water hyacinth still clogs local waterways in drought times (like now.)
The thing about nutria is, for one thing, they are kind of nasty. They are roughly the size of a mid-sized dog, have oily fur, red eyes, and big orange-yellow teeth. They have a reputation for nasty behavior, as well. Most of the stories I have heard happened when someone unknowingly cornered a nutria rat, often near a nest; and actually, most mammals, including humans, are pretty mean and protective in a situation like that. One person I know, who lives near a branch of the LNVA irrigation canal, tells a great story about inadvertently cornering a nutria on his screened-in back porch one night. The cartoon-ish encounter ended with the nutria calmly exiting the porch through the screen door – through it, literally – while my friend, frantic and armed with a straw broom, the only reasonable facsimile of a defensive weapon available to him at the time, cowered on top of his patio table.
As I have mentioned before, I used to duck hunt in my youth, and most of my experiences rubbing shoulders with our friend the nutria came from back then.
At one time, there was a guy down in Labelle who paid a dollar a piece for dead nutria, provided you had shot them in the head; which was pretty easy, since a nutria swims with only the top two-thirds of its head protruding above the surface, so that is what you aim at, anyway. This guy wanted them shot in the head because apparently there was/is a market for nutria pelts, which resemble a beaver’s, actually. At a dollar apiece, dude was making a pretty nice profit, I’d guess; but he can have it. He lived in a decrepit trailer about fifty yards from Taylor’s Bayou, with trash everywhere in his “yard”, and I don’t even want to know what he did with all those nutria carcasses after he skinned them.
I never resorted to nutria hunting myself, although not because of any high-mindedness on my part. Mainly, I just didn’t want to mess with nutria in any way, shape, or form. I did know guys who, if the duck hunting was slow, would turn around and start blasting the nutria, which were pretty much everywhere one looked out in the marsh. They could usually bag enough in about ten minutes to pay for a six-pack and gas money for the drive home.
I have often thought one of the local high schools should adopt the nutria rat as a mascot. When they combined all the high schools down in Port Arthur awhile back into one big mega-educational conglomerate and created Memorial High School, what did they come up with to call this group of former Bumblebees, Yellow Jackets, and Eagles? The Titans, about as lame a mascot as one could imagine. They should have named them the Nutria Rats. It’d be unique, plus they’d have a mascot that would intimidate the hell out of opponents. Great potential cheers, too. “Nutria rat, nutria rat, rodent of might! Eat water hyacinth all day, and kick your ass all night!!”
By way of disclosure, I should say my own ambivalence toward the lowly nutria comes from a couple of personal encounters, both over twenty years ago, out in the marsh. The first one – when I stumbled upon a mom and her babies, who had built a nest in a long-unused duck blind I had impulsively decided that morning to use again – was so grotesque it would have made Wes Craven and Steven King blush, so I won’t repeat the details here. Let’s just say the blind was small, and the mother nutria didn’t want me to come in, and it was dark and I was startled and didn’t know what the hell was snarling at me, and instead of a straw broom I had a Remington 12-gauge loaded with magnums (goose shot), and I reacted instinctively. Needless to say, that blind went on being unused for quite awhile longer after that.
My other close encounter of the nutria rat kind was more benign, but it didn’t end much better for the nutria, or for me. I was walking down a levee early one morning, moving from one pothole to another in the dawn’s early light, when I apparently came up on a nest. Anyway, all I knew was I was looking at this big nutria reared up on its hind legs in the marsh grass, about ten yards in front of me on this narrow path I was on, on top of the levee. He was staring at me with his red eyes, and flashing his overbite, with those big, bright orange front teeth. I clicked off the safety on the Remington, not sure what was going to happen next. What ended up happening was, after about 15 seconds that nutria dropped down, lowered its head, and charged me. I wasn’t expecting that, but managed to get the shotgun aimed in the nutria’s general direction by the time he was about fifteen feet from me. A shotgun can do a lot of damage from that range.
I still shudder when I think about it. It is startling to be all alone in the marsh and have an evil looking water rat charge you, with obvious malevolent intent. The adrenaline rush from that encounter probably didn’t wear off me until sometime much later that afternoon. For all that, though, I had a grudging respect and even admiration for that nutria, and still do. He had to know he had no chance against me and the 12-gauge, that charging me was suicide. But he didn’t think twice about it, he did it anyway. I think what scared me so much and got my adrenaline going, even though I pretty much knew ahead of time how things would to turn out, was that for an instant during his charge I could see the look in that nutria’s eyes, and I could tell that he just didn’t give a fuck. At all. Hence, my respect.
And why I think the nutria would be a great team mascot anyone could be proud of.
*****
I never resorted to nutria hunting myself, although not because of any high-mindedness on my part. Mainly, I just didn’t want to mess with nutria in any way, shape, or form. I did know guys who, if the duck hunting was slow, would turn around and start blasting the nutria, which were pretty much everywhere one looked out in the marsh. They could usually bag enough in about ten minutes to pay for a six-pack and gas money for the drive home.
I have often thought one of the local high schools should adopt the nutria rat as a mascot. When they combined all the high schools down in Port Arthur awhile back into one big mega-educational conglomerate and created Memorial High School, what did they come up with to call this group of former Bumblebees, Yellow Jackets, and Eagles? The Titans, about as lame a mascot as one could imagine. They should have named them the Nutria Rats. It’d be unique, plus they’d have a mascot that would intimidate the hell out of opponents. Great potential cheers, too. “Nutria rat, nutria rat, rodent of might! Eat water hyacinth all day, and kick your ass all night!!”
By way of disclosure, I should say my own ambivalence toward the lowly nutria comes from a couple of personal encounters, both over twenty years ago, out in the marsh. The first one – when I stumbled upon a mom and her babies, who had built a nest in a long-unused duck blind I had impulsively decided that morning to use again – was so grotesque it would have made Wes Craven and Steven King blush, so I won’t repeat the details here. Let’s just say the blind was small, and the mother nutria didn’t want me to come in, and it was dark and I was startled and didn’t know what the hell was snarling at me, and instead of a straw broom I had a Remington 12-gauge loaded with magnums (goose shot), and I reacted instinctively. Needless to say, that blind went on being unused for quite awhile longer after that.
My other close encounter of the nutria rat kind was more benign, but it didn’t end much better for the nutria, or for me. I was walking down a levee early one morning, moving from one pothole to another in the dawn’s early light, when I apparently came up on a nest. Anyway, all I knew was I was looking at this big nutria reared up on its hind legs in the marsh grass, about ten yards in front of me on this narrow path I was on, on top of the levee. He was staring at me with his red eyes, and flashing his overbite, with those big, bright orange front teeth. I clicked off the safety on the Remington, not sure what was going to happen next. What ended up happening was, after about 15 seconds that nutria dropped down, lowered its head, and charged me. I wasn’t expecting that, but managed to get the shotgun aimed in the nutria’s general direction by the time he was about fifteen feet from me. A shotgun can do a lot of damage from that range.
I still shudder when I think about it. It is startling to be all alone in the marsh and have an evil looking water rat charge you, with obvious malevolent intent. The adrenaline rush from that encounter probably didn’t wear off me until sometime much later that afternoon. For all that, though, I had a grudging respect and even admiration for that nutria, and still do. He had to know he had no chance against me and the 12-gauge, that charging me was suicide. But he didn’t think twice about it, he did it anyway. I think what scared me so much and got my adrenaline going, even though I pretty much knew ahead of time how things would to turn out, was that for an instant during his charge I could see the look in that nutria’s eyes, and I could tell that he just didn’t give a fuck. At all. Hence, my respect.
And why I think the nutria would be a great team mascot anyone could be proud of.
*****
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