Capybara

About the Capybara

The capybara is the largest rodent alive, a barrel-shaped grazer of South American wetlands that looks like a guinea pig scaled up beyond reason. Eyes, ears and nostrils sit high on the head so it can stay submerged with only the top showing, and its feet are partly webbed. It is semi-aquatic in the fullest sense — it feeds, mates, sleeps and escapes in water.

How it lives

Capybaras live in groups, sometimes large ones, around rivers, marshes and flooded grassland, grazing on grasses and aquatic plants. Like rabbits, they re-ingest their own droppings to extract more from a low-quality diet. They are famously tolerant of other animals sitting on them, which is less remarkable than it looks — they are prey animals that gain nothing from confrontation. Young are born well developed and are looked after by any lactating female in the group.

Where it lives

Lounges near rivers and wetlands in relaxed family groups. Its main habitat is the Amazon Rainforest, where the climate is warm and extremely humid with heavy rainfall all year round.

Notable facts

• The largest rodent in the world.
• It's a fantastic swimmer with webbed feet.
• Famously chill — other animals love to sit on them.

Conservation

Capybaras are common and in places increasing, benefiting from the conversion of forest to cattle pasture near water. They are hunted for meat and hides across much of their range, and farmed in some countries. In parts of Argentina and Brazil suburban populations have grown large enough to be treated as a nuisance, which is an unusual problem for a wild animal to have.

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