Debbie Kruger, age 10, of Fremont, Nebraska, for her question:

What is a capybara?

A rat as big as a pig would scare you silly. But the capybara would never scare you, though he is a pig sized member of the rodent clan. Actually he is more like an overgrown bunny who looks very much like an extra large guinea pig. We find him in parts of Central America and in South America, east of the Andes. He prefers to live near a stream so that he can dive into the water and swim to safety when threatened by his mortal enemy, the jaguar. The capybara has a large head and a blunt face with a gentle expression. His rather coarse coat is greyish or brownish, with paler tints on his tummy. He has extra long back legs for leaping, webbed toes for swimming and no tail worth mentioning. When fully grown, he may stand four feet tall at shoulder level and tip the scales at 100 pounds.