'Giant 4-foot-long monster rat' found in London could be African

The creature is believed to be a cane rat, with experts believing the rodents could be breeding in London’s sewers.

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Pest controllers had their work cut out when a 'monster rat' was found in a playground in London.
The creature, believed to be a giant rat, was said to be bigger than a cat or a Jack Russell.
Gas engineer Tony Smith, 46, saw the rodent, which he claimed was up to 4 feet long, while working at a block of flats in London.
The large rodent, which reportedly weighed about 25lbs, was seen in a bush next to a popular children's playground.
The average body length of an adult rat is 9 to 11 inches, with a tail of 7 to 9 inches.
Pest-control experts at Rentokil believe the rodents could be breeding below the city streets.

A spokesperson explained the average brown rat in the UK is just one foot in length, compared to the two feet rodent discovered in Hackney.
A spokesperson for the pest control company said: "As a comparison the body of your average brown rat is up to 40cm in length with a tail shorter than the head and body, and about 350g - 500g in weight.
"They prefer ground living and burrowing but sometime have been know to climb. In urban areas there is often ready access to food, water and shelter.
"The brown rat is the only species to occur in sewers in the UK."
Some have claimed the rat is not, in fact, giant but there is a perspective trick involved.
Shop owners at Ridley Road market, which has over 180 stalls selling African, Asian and Caribbean food, were keen to condemn the selling of grasscutter rats, but some said they had heard rumours of rare African cuts being sold illegally.

Nazam Ali, who has run a fruit and vegetable stall at Ridley Road Market for 15 years, says he is aware of people selling bush meat like monkey at the market.
Mr Ali, 44, said: "I think people keep it under cover. There's a demand for it, things like bush meat.
"Maybe grasscutter rats are being sold, I don't know.
"People want to eat what they had back home and it's harder to get hold of here in Britain."
The creature was found dead near to an area where children play, which backed onto a railway track near Hackney Downs, north London on Thursday.
Mr Smith asked his electrician friend James Green to hold the rat while he took a picture.
His friends have reacted to the image with a mixture of 'glee and disgust'.
Mr Smith said: "This is the largest rat I've ever seen in my entire life.
"I've got a cat and a Jack Russell and it was bigger than both of those put together.
"I'd say it was about four foot.
"We were going to stick it in the bin, but before we did we thought we had better take a picture or people won't believe it's real."

'Giant 4-foot-long monster rat' found in children's playground in London could be African species - Telegraph

probably some kids pet that ran off

can a man hold 25 pounds on a stick effortlessly like that ?

This is the way the world ends
Not with a bang but a whimper.

_ T.S. Eliot, The Hollow Men

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Originally Posted by blue

probably some kids pet that ran off

can a man hold 25 pounds on a stick effortlessly like that ?

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You reckon it's a fake?

It's the stuff of nightmares... When i lived in Africa these where quite common.
The dogs killed them for fun:dogrocks:

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Good one, probably photo shopped.

I have seen these beastly big rats in real life also, not just in Africa but Spain.
So why not London? i reckon it's real :spin:..

its not photoshop ,just the perspective making it look bigger
its big but not 4 foot or 25 pounds


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Is monster rat a hoax? Rodent 'size of a child' could be camera trick or different animal - Mirror Online

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Originally Posted by blue

probably some kids pet that ran off

can a man hold 25 pounds on a stick effortlessly like that ?

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10 odd kilos? Yeah, not hard for someone of average strength to hold that up

Well, they're including the tail, of course...

It could feed a whole isaan village that one, yes.

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Originally Posted by Chittychangchang

You reckon it's a fake?

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the photo is a perspective shot - it is not the 4 foot rat which

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Gas engineer Tony Smith, 46

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after a night on polish beer

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saw the rodent

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which he claimed was up to 4 feet long

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which reportedly weighed about 25lbs

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and

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was seen in a bush

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click bait , so more advertisements can be looked at

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Originally Posted by khmen

10 odd kilos? Yeah, not hard for someone of average strength to hold that up

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10 kgs away from your side - I suggest you go and try and report back

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The whole country could be overrun by next week.

How to fake a giant rat (and why you shouldn't trust pictures on the internet) | Media | The Guardian

A sort of pictorial equivalent of a piwanoi post, then.

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Originally Posted by cyrille

A sort of pictorial equivalent of a piwanoi post, then.

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Or just about any of ENT or Albert's in the 9/11 thread, pictorial or not.

:rofl:

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Originally Posted by cyrille

A sort of pictorial equivalent of a piwanoi post, then.

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Quite the opposite. He posts with a total lack of perspective.

It looks like a Coypu to me. They are wild in Norfolk.

Bloody Africans, coming here and taking our, er, er, rubbish.

I strongly suspect that this is the Animal , I remember quite well that my late wife and I saw one near our hotel in The Gambia West Africa which was as large as a average sized moggie , you may find the video quite interesting https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jrp2UgbYJn4

Get the barbie fired up.

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Originally Posted by blue

its not photoshop ,just the perspective making it look bigger
its big but not 4 foot or 25 pounds


https://teakdoor.com/images/imported/2016/03/603.jpg
Is monster rat a hoax? Rodent 'size of a child' could be camera trick or different animal - Mirror Online

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Old fishing trick to hold your catch well in front of you to make it appear much bigger than it is. I did it all the time when fishing in Mexico and Canada. Sometimes it was not needed since the fish were actually very big.

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Originally Posted by Warwick

It looks like a Coypu to me. They are wild in Norfolk.

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They was Warwick , however they got wiped out decades ago , I remember they used to show them in travelling fairgrounds describing them as Giant sewer Rats , the info about the Coypu's demise is here :) http://vege1.kan.ynu.ac.jp/isp/pdf/baker.pdf

I saw a rat that big run through a hotel restaurant dining floor in Chang Mai, it wasn't even afraid, it wandered around casually until a Farang woman screamed.

^
That was a cat disguised as a mouse.

Visited a museum in White Horse in the Yukon...There was a statue of a prehistoric beaver which was the size of a black bear...Massive fooking rodent...

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Originally Posted by BaitongBoy

There was a statue of a prehistoric beaver which was the size of a black bear.

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reminds me of my 1st bunk up :)

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Originally Posted by Hans Mann

It could feed a whole isaan village that one, yes.

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Yeah, some decent size prime cuts on that one, yummy!
:)

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Originally Posted by stroller

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Originally Posted by Hans Mann

It could feed a whole isaan village that one, yes.

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Yeah, some decent size prime cuts on that one, yummy!
:)

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I envision a viable foreign import in our future......

;)

^ Been there, done that......in 1998

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Rapidly multiplying nutria are devastating Thailand's rice farms

Thai farmland falls foul to furry menace

Farms in Thailand are under siege from the latest farming fad - nutria.

The animals, which look like giant rats, have a voracious vegetarian appetite and are causing havoc in rice paddies up and down the country. At home in the marshy terrain, the rodents' burrowing erodes the fields with devastating results.

With Thailand reeling from its worst recession in decades, farmers desperate for extra cash thought nutria were the answer to their prayers.

The rodents are cheap to buy, multiply at a terrific rate and can be sold at a profit.

Farmer Panya Meethong saw the animals as his economic saviour.

"When I was just rice farming I didn't have enough money to pay for my children's school fees. Life was a real struggle. Then I saw my neighbour breeding the nutria earning lots of money so I decided to have a go."

Originally from South America, nutria were brought to Thailand three years ago by a Taiwanese businessman who set up companies to promote the animals.

Farmers make their money by buying a breeding pair and selling their offspring back. The animals are finally sold for their meat or fur.

However, Thailand's farmers are not about to go through a nutria breeding revolution.

The problem is that the market for nutria meat and fur has never really developed. Unable to sell the animals, farmers turn them loose in the swampy rice paddies where they cause tremendous damage to the vegetation.

Fearing environmental disaster, the government is considering a complete ban on the import and export of the animals.

The Minister of Agriculture, Dr Suthiporn Chirapanda, said: "We think that nutria are detrimental to farming in Thailand, so at the moment, the government is not going to support nutria farming and we want to discourage it."

Livestock officers now have the job of searching for the runaway rodents which are creating a serious problem.

Too much of a menace to be set free, slaughter looks like the only option for the unwanted nutria.

BBC News | Asia-Pacific | Thai farmland falls foul to furry menace

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Originally Posted by Hans Mann

slaughter looks like the only option

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well , it was the original plan

The original plan was $$$

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Livestock officers now have the job of searching for the runaway rodents which are creating a serious problem.

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Who's the unlucky sod that had the job of searching for active livestock officers?

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Originally Posted by Hans Mann

^ Been there, done that......in 1998

https://teakdoor.com/images/imported/2016/03/620.jpg
Rapidly multiplying nutria are devastating Thailand's rice farms

Thai farmland falls foul to furry menace

Farms in Thailand are under siege from the latest farming fad - nutria.

The animals, which look like giant rats, have a voracious vegetarian appetite and are causing havoc in rice paddies up and down the country. At home in the marshy terrain, the rodents' burrowing erodes the fields with devastating results.

With Thailand reeling from its worst recession in decades, farmers desperate for extra cash thought nutria were the answer to their prayers.

The rodents are cheap to buy, multiply at a terrific rate and can be sold at a profit.

Farmer Panya Meethong saw the animals as his economic saviour.

"When I was just rice farming I didn't have enough money to pay for my children's school fees. Life was a real struggle. Then I saw my neighbour breeding the nutria earning lots of money so I decided to have a go."

Originally from South America, nutria were brought to Thailand three years ago by a Taiwanese businessman who set up companies to promote the animals.

Farmers make their money by buying a breeding pair and selling their offspring back. The animals are finally sold for their meat or fur.

However, Thailand's farmers are not about to go through a nutria breeding revolution.

The problem is that the market for nutria meat and fur has never really developed. Unable to sell the animals, farmers turn them loose in the swampy rice paddies where they cause tremendous damage to the vegetation.

Fearing environmental disaster, the government is considering a complete ban on the import and export of the animals.

The Minister of Agriculture, Dr Suthiporn Chirapanda, said: "We think that nutria are detrimental to farming in Thailand, so at the moment, the government is not going to support nutria farming and we want to discourage it."

Livestock officers now have the job of searching for the runaway rodents which are creating a serious problem.

Too much of a menace to be set free, slaughter looks like the only option for the unwanted nutria.

BBC News | Asia-Pacific | Thai farmland falls foul to furry menace

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Nutria is just another name for Coypu :) BTW the biggest rodent in the World is the South American Capybara weights of 50kgs/60kgs are quite common .