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Thousands of Dead Nutria Pile up on Mississippi Beaches after Isaac - by Miguel Llanos, NBC News - If there's a silver lining for the Gulf Coast from Hurricane Isaac, it might just be this: the surge of water flushed out, and drowned, thousands of nutria--rodent-like aquatic mammals originally from South America that are eating away at marshlands acting as a barrier from storms. ''Estimates are there will be over 20,000 carcasses,'' Robbie Wilbur, spokesman for the state's department of environmental quality, told NBC News. In the short term, that many rotting carcasses is a health hazard. ''It's a terrible smell,'' David Garcia, mayor of Waveland in Hancock county, told WLOX-TV. ''As this heat continues, they're just going to blow up and pop, making it even more of a health hazard.'' Crews over the weekend started removing the nutria, aka swamp rats, though it's not an easy task. ''As they're picking them up, they're busting open,'' Hancock County Supervisor David Yarborough told the Biloxi-Gulfport Sun Herald. - Nutria are one of the Gulf South's most notorious invasive species, wreaking ecological havoc on native wetland vegetation and contributing to coastal erosion problems. - Full story: Thousands of dead nutria pile up on Mississippi beaches after Isaac - U.S. News
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HabaneroRed06Si

Feel sorry for the guys who hunt these things on that reality show. They count on hunting these things to put food on the table.

Adair

Is that what the show is about? Haven't seen it, only advertisements for swamp hunters that look a bit seedy...and, it's no wonder they do, if they're hunting nutria. (Don't know why I thought they were after alligators or crocs, etc. ...might be getting tv shows confused.)

It's gross in the article when it says, ''As this heat continues, they're just going to blow up and pop, making it even more of a health hazard.'' *puke*

PurpleStuff

gross