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Nutria Pond behind the Milwaukie Public Library
- Good for Kids:
- Yes
4 reviews for Nutria Pond behind the Milwaukie Public Library
This is one of the best outings around Portland I've ever had. I brought dog food (very nutritious hopefully - though next time I'll bring carrots) and watched as the very first Nutria I'd ever seen came near to see if I had any treats. Before the evening was over 3 or 4 had come over to feed though none felt it necessary to come very close - which was OK by me.
They're truly adorable and a real treasure.
I love to come here and hang with the Nutria!
If you feed them, make sure that you keep your fingers out of the way city slicker! They're not vicious, your fingers just look like yummy carrot sticks!
On my morning bus rides from the Laurelhurst area to the township of Milwaukie (it's a city? Really?!?), there was a line from a Regina Spektor song I frequently chose on my iPod to cheer me up about my impending destination:
"He was perfect except for the fact that he was an engineer/ Mothers prefer doctors and lawyers."
No, office management at an engineering firm was not the barrel of laughs you might expect. I spent a lot of time cursing the long commute, cursing the strangely-shaped parcels I had to ship every day, and cursing the hamlet of Milwaukie by association. Then at some point, I walked toward the main thoroughfare and found some of the most bizarre critters I had ever seen. They had heads and bodies that reminded me of beavers but with long, skinny rat tails. They foraged in groups of four or five at a time. The ducks did not seem alarmed by them in the slightest. I asked one of the engineers what the hell the things were. He paused from his stimulating photo of a storm drain long enough to inform me that the creatures were called nutria.
I researched the nutrias' origins. They were brought to Oregon by fur trappers in the 1930s with the expectation that the rodents' tar-like pelts would be all the rage of debutantes all over the Northwest. This was not to be, and the nutria were forgotten and left to breed like no tomorrow all over the Portland Metro area. The pond next to the Milwaukie Public Library had become their established stomping grounds and swimming holes.
Transplant identification, maybe, but the nutria drew me in. I loved the unlikelihood of them. I loved how they resembled things that were dredged out of a swamp but continued to go about their small animal business just like the humans. When I was yelled at for not being able to visit every single package-shipping company within five miles to find out which deliverer could get a roll of blueprints to Snohomish County by yesterday, I walked and watched the nutria scuttle around the grass. When the accounting failures of the last three operating years of the company fell on my shoulders to catalog, I stalled and visited the pond to see the nutria sniff at wet leaves. When the first snow fell and delayed all the buses for full hours at a time, I wandered back to the library and worried that the nutria wouldn't find enough food to stay nourished. And when I finally bid adieu to the job and the village of Milwaukie, I left without saying goodbye to my not-quite-rat friends.
Which is good because I read they charge people at random, nibble at gardens, and probably eat babies. But not engineers, yet.
I had never heard of nutria until I came to Portland. For those of you who are in the dark, too, Nutria are most easily described as Beaver rats. Smaller than beavers, they are around the size of a house cat, with greasy beaver-like fur, giant orange teeth that never stop growing, beady eyes and a big rat tail.
While the above description is a little nightmarish, I swear there is something cute about these little guys. If you're looking for something off the beaten path to explore in Portland, and maybe you're even wanting to interact with wildlife, I always recommend a visit to the Nutria just over the city line in Milwaukie.
Park at the Library and head to the little pond that sits behind it. Be sure to bring food with you--I've had good luck feeding them bread, bagels, and kale, but I get the feeling they would eat anything. Then stand on the little land bridge in the pond with food in hand and after awhile, these little guys will start pulling themselves out of the water to eat out of your hand. They tend to swarm around you, so be prepared! For added adventure, try this at night with flashlights.
(If you like the idea of bizarre day trips in the suburbs of Portland, but are scared of Beaver Rats, try Mount Angel Abbey instead. All the animals there are dead and stuffed).
