MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Asunción City Hall declares local species to be animals of value

Weasels are essential fighting insects in Asunción

The City Hall of Paraguay's capital has this week declared the weasel, also known locally for its Guarani name mykurẽ, as an animal of value and importance.

“The famous mykure, which are opossums, are small animals that look like rats because of their aggressive appearance and, unfortunately, people hurt them, attack them, and the truth is that these animals are extremely important for the balance of the ecosystem, they are like pest controllers,” said Councilwoman Jazmín Galeano.

She also explained that “95% of this species is immune to rabies and does not transmit diseases.”

Galeano also pointed out the creatures, despite appearances, were “not aggressive,” although they may seem violent because “when they are scared they show their teeth as a defense mechanism.”

“Taking into account that they are omnivores, that is, they feed on everything, it is normal to find them in urban areas and it is very normal for them to appear in any yard in Asunción. It seems important to me that we as Municipality declare the valuation of this species, in order to protect it,” Galeano went on.

The mykure, weasel or opossum, has the scientific name Didelphis albiventris. It is a species of marsupial didelphimorph of the Didelphidae family, which lives throughout South America and, due to its flexibility, has survived numerous changes that have occurred on the continent over millions of years.

According to Asunción City Hall environmental authorities, the hovera weasel is a “great controller of insects, small rodents and reptiles; it feeds on fruits and seeds that it then disperses, being found in a large part of the city of Asunción, being its natural geographic distribution before the urbanization of the city,” while the mykure pytã or red weasel is of marshy areas, that is, wetlands or marshes.

Conservationist work in defense of an endangered species in Argentina's dry Chaco has just earned the scientist behind it a “Green Oscar.”