Rats as big as cats? More likely a Coypu
It was unusual meeting one during the heat of the day; coypus are more active at night and you generally see them early in the morning or at dusk. The encounter reminded me of John and Mary, two friends of mine who bought a tent a few years ago and headed off to France on a camping holiday. All went well for a couple of days. Then, early one morning, Mary emerged from the tent to find herself face to face with “the largest rat she had ever seen in her life.” She was panic-stricken. Camping was abandoned; the rest of the holiday was spent in hotels. Mary never slept in a tent again. But was the animal she had encountered actually a rat and did it pose any threat to her?
The terrifying monster could well have been my Camargue friend the coypu. The name is South American and roughly translates as ‘swamp beaver’. Compared to the brown rat, which weighs up to half a kilogram, this is a huge animal; a very large one can reach nine kilograms. It has a long rat-like tail, but the head is more like a beaver’s than a rat’s. Its ears are tiny and it has conspicuous whiskers. The little eyes are set high in the head so that it can see when swimming. Its teats are also high up so that babies, riding on its back, can suckle while their mother swims. To me, the Coypu seems a cuddly endearing creature and not at all fearsome.
