Recently, Gollum showed up at a Washington State rest stop. This week, there’s a strange-looking, long-legged rodent on the loose at Bear Creek Lake Park in Colorado. It’s a Patagonian mara, and it belongs in South America. And yet, there’s one hanging out in Lakewood, Colorado, offering locals a good time attempting to identify it.
Kara Van Hoose with Colorado Parks and Wildlife (CPW) informed 9 News that CPW has actually set live-capture traps around the park in hopes they can catch the Patagonian mara and find a safe home for it. It’s most likely the animal was somebody’s pet that left.
Patagonian maras are long-legged rodents that appear like a cross in between a tall bunny and a tiny deer with a huge head. They have a grayish-brown coat of fur with some white and orange mixed therein, too. They have actually clawed toes, long ears, and short tails.
These large rodents can grow to be simply under 2.5 feet long, and, importantly, they reside in Argentina. In their natural environment, maras live in brush-covered areas and meadows. They primarily eat grasses, seeds, fruits, and flowers, but they likewise eat their own poop, you understand, “to optimize nutrition absorption.”
Visitors to Bear Creek Lake Park may see the mara hopping or “stotting” around like a deer.
“Maras relocation in a range of ways,” says Smithsonian’s National Zoo on its site. “They may walk, hop in a rabbit-like fashion, gallop or stot– an unique kind of locomotion generally displayed by ungulates, where the animal bounces on all fours.”
See the news segment here:
If you see this animal, please call CPW at 303-297-1192.
There’s a long-legged rodent with a doubtful diet plan on the loose at Bear Creek Lake Park in Colorado. This Patagonian mara is far from home.