Super Amazing Magawa the Rat!
A rat named Magawa won an animal bravery award for sniffing out dozens of landmines in Cambodia. Magawa was awarded a gold medal by the People's Dispensary for Sick Animals, a veterinary charity in the United Kingdom, making him the first rodent in the nonprofit's history to earn this honour. M. According to PDSA, Magawa, an African giant pouched rat, has found 39 landmines and 28 unexploded items. His work has helped to clear more than 141,000 square meters of land – or an area that is about the size of 20 soccer fields.
About African Giant Pouched Rats
While many people call this animal an African Giant Pouched Rat or a Gambian Giant Pouched Rat it isn't a rat, but it does belong to the African muroid family. It has large pouches in its cheeks like a hamster and will stuff its cheeks so full of seeds that they sometimes have difficulty entering their dens. These animals live in underground colonies in the wild and have very poor eyesight. However, they do have an excellent sense of smell which makes them uniquely suited for mine detection work. Giant pouched rats can grow up to almost a meter long including the length of their tail/
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| Giant Pouched Rat By Louisvarley |
About the PDSA Award Program
The PDSA Animal Awards programme seeks to raise the status of animals in society and honour the incredible contribution they make to our lives.
APOPO, which stands for Anti-Persoonsmijnen Ontmijnende Product Ontwikkeling in Dutch, or Anti-Personnel Landmines Removal Product Development in English, is a non-profit based out of Tanzania that trains rats like Magawa to find landmines. Apparently, rats are the only animals that can safely detect landmines because they are lightweight and have a keen sense of smell.
Did you know that rats are much faster than humans at finding landmines?
PDSA said Magawa the rat can search an area the size of a tennis court in 30 minutes, which could take a human with a metal detector up to four days.
Sources:
- https://www.cbsnews.com/news/african-giant-pouched-rat-magawa-pdsa-gold-medal-sniffing-landmines/?intcid=CNM-00-10abd1h
- Gambian pouched rat - Wikipedia
About This Author
Sister Su is grateful to God for keeping her alive. She writes on a number of blogs, has a YouTube channel and is most easily reached through Twitter @Sister_Su
This post was proofread by the free version of Grammarly
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