Overview

• Hunting data show a record near 117,500 nutria removed nationwide in the 2023/24 season, according to the DJV.
• Mecklenburg-Vorpommern reports 4,037 animals taken in the first half of 2025 and the previous year combined, up from 143 about a decade ago.
• Regional hotspots include North Rhine-Westphalia (60%), Lower Saxony (55%) and Saxony-Anhalt (50%), with urban concentrations in Bremen (93%) and Hamburg (74%) of participating districts.
• The DJV cites illegal feeding, favorable climate and hunting restrictions as drivers of growth, and says trapping accounts for nearly half of removals nationally, higher in Bremen and Lower Saxony.
• Based on WILD monitoring across more than 23,000 hunting districts, the DJV urges adding nutria to federal hunting law and explicit political support for trapping, while noting data are not collected annually.