Otters

Nature 5 Minutes

These adorable aquatic mammals are clever, chatty, and oddly aromatic.

THERE ARE 13 SPECIES OF OTTERS, AND JUST ABOUT ALL OF THEM ARE DECREASING.

Only one otter species seems to be thriving, and that’s the North American River Otter. The other 12 otter species were recently identified by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) as having decreasing populations, and five otter species are already on the endangered list. Among the endangered are the sea otters along the Californian to Alaskan coasts, which are threatened by “environmental pollutants and disease agents.” Others, like the marine otters of South America, have had their numbers reduced because of poaching, as well as environmental concerns.

ZOROASTRIANS THOUGHT THE OTTERS TO BE NEARLY SACRED CREATURES.

This ancient religion considered otters to be the dogs of the river or sea and had strict rules forbidding the killing of otters. It was thought that otters helped keep water purified by eating already dead creatures that might contaminate the water source if they were allowed to rot. Zoroastrians would also hold ceremonies for otters found dead in the wild.

OTTERS HAVE VERY DISTINCTIVE POOP, AND THAT SCAT HAS ITS OWN NAME.

Otters use their dung—known as spraint—to communicate with other otters. The mammals like to keep things organized within their communities and will designate certain areas to be used as latrines. Spraint scents can vary, but often are (relatively) pleasant—one expert described them as not “dissimilar to jasmine tea.” Spraint composition is unique to each otter, and the creatures can identify each other by the smells. Scientists suspect otters may even be able to determine the sex, age, and reproductive status of the spraint dropper just from a quick whiff. And since otters have superb metabolisms and can easily eat up to 15 percent of their body weight each day, there’s a lot of spraint to go around.

OTTER MOMS ARE TOTALLY GAME FOR ADOPTION.

In 2001, a female otter at the Monterey Bay Aquarium gave birth to a stillborn pup on the same day a stranded pup was discovered in the wild nearby. The aquarium staff had previously tried raising pups themselves but found that hand-raised otters became too attached to humans to be released back into the wild. So instead, they dropped the pup in with the female otter, and she immediately went into mom mode. The aquarium has since devised a system of hand-rearing pups for the first six to eight weeks—mostly for bottle feeding purposes—before handing the pups off to female otters for raising. At six months, the pups are released back into the wild with generally strong results.

THEY HAVE THE THICKEST FUR OF ANY MAMMAL IN THE ANIMAL KINGDOM.

Otters can have up to one million hairs per square inch. There are two layers of fur—an undercoat and then longer hairs that we can see. The layers manage to trap air next to the otter’s skin, which keeps the otters dry and warm and also helps with buoyancy. Otter pups have so much air trapped in there, they actually can’t dive under water, even if they want to.

AN OTTER IS SOMETIMES ONLY AS GOOD AS HIS TOOLS.

Otters love to eat shelled animals, like clams, but they aren’t equipped with the strength to open their food without some help. Therefore, they are big on tools and will often use rocks to help crack into dinner. While they hunt for food underwater, they’ll often store a rock in the skin under their arms for later use.

OTTERS ARE POPULAR IN NATIVE AMERICAN CULTURES, BUT FOR VARYING REASONS.

Some tribes consider the otter to be a lucky animal and a symbol of “loyalty and honesty.” But some, particularly in present-day Canada and Alaska, viewed the river otter “with awe and dread” and associated the creatures with the undead and drowning. Some cultures even forbid eating the creatures and were offended when colonial Europeans began hunting the river otters and selling their furs.

GIANT OTTERS ARE SUPER CHATTY.

In 2014, a study of giant otters found that the river-dwellers have 22 distinct noises they make for different situations. On top of that, pups have 11 of their own calls that they intersperse with “infant babbling.” Among the most notable calls: a “hum gradation” used to tell otters to change directions and a “Hah!” shout when a threat is nearby.

SEE A GROUP OF OTTERS? THAT’S A ROMP. OR A BEVY.

Or a family or a raft. Otter groups go by a few different monikers, all of which are fairly unique to that crew. Generally, a group of otters on land will go by a romp, while a group hanging in the water is called a raft.

OTTERS ARE BIG ON PLAY TIME, AND MAKING SLIDES IS AMONG THEIR FAVORITE GAMES.

Otter families are usually limited to pups and their mothers, and these duos will spend most of their time either feeding or sleeping. In the downtime, though, otters love to play and will often build themselves slides along the banks of rivers.

BABY OTTERS ARE BUOYANT, BUT THEY CAN’T SWIM ON THEIR OWN.

A mother will often wrap the babies in kelp to keep them in one place while she hunts. Or, she might rely on human resources and otter ingenuity to find a makeshift “playpen” for her pup.

THEIR BEHAVIOR ISN’T ALWAYS ADORABLE.

Like many animals, otters sometimes behave in ways that aren’t exactly within the bounds of what humans would consider morally acceptable. Even if you find them otherwise adorable, otters’ mating habits will no doubt make your stomach turn.

Male otters’ mating techniques are violent. They bite their female partner’s face during copulation to keep her from slipping away, leaving her with substantial facial wounds. It’s not uncommon for female otters to die as a result of these aggressive encounters, either through drowning or from their wounds becoming infected. Male otters have also been known to violently copulate with other species—most notably, baby seals. The behavior doesn’t stop when the seals die from the trauma. Otters have been known to guard and have sex with the bodies of their victims for up to seven days after they’ve died.

Scientists hypothesize that these seemingly counterproductive mating habits might be the result of a population imbalance. In California’s Monterey Bay, where scientists observed otters trying to copulate with the week-old bodies of dead baby seals, there are far more male otters than females. Facing a lack of female partners, male otters may be engaging in what researchers call “misdirected sexual activity.” The area in the bay where the scientists observed the most otter-on-seal mating sessions was also where there was a high population of transient male otters, ones that, unlike more dominant males, don’t have an established territory filled with potential mates. In the absence of females of their own kind, then, they turned their typical sexual responses toward the seals. Nature, unfortunately, isn’t always pretty.

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Published by pat frederick

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63 thoughts on “Otters”

    1. Morning, GA! I love otters’ playfulness. Many animals are aggressive during breeding – stallions will frequently bite the mares’ necks, altho it doesn’t usually draw blood.

      Liked by 1 person

    1. Very symbolic – PDJT is wearing his usual blue suit, super-bright white shirt (always the whitest in any room) with Presidential Seal cufflinks, and either a snake skin (The Snake) or an alligator (defeat DeSantis) belt. I didn’t see his shoes.

      No tie – no hat – he carried a red Trump MAGA hat to the podium, but never put it on!

      Wonder what that symbolizes?

      Wonder what First Lady Melania will wear for her first public appearance? She’s always sending a symbolic message with her fashion choices.

      Liked by 1 person

    1. Oh, how cool! Thanks, GA! Yep – that’s a Norfolk license plate. Hmph! Not far from where he grew up and yet he is an Iowa Hawkeyes fan?!?! For shame!!!! Have you ever seen the video from when he returned for a visit to Norfolk years later? Tsk-tsk, Johnny! Stop mispronouncing Norfolk! It is pronounced NORFORK!!!

      Liked by 1 person

  4. “Pennsylvania chocolate factory explosion leaves five dead and six missing — West Reading Mayor Samantha Kaag praised the first responders for their swift action.”

    ENTIRE ARTICLE @ JustTheNews: “An explosion at a chocolate factory in Pennsylvania killed at least five people, and authorities were searching Saturday for six missing workers. The Pennsylvania Emergency Management Agency confirmed the number of deaths Saturday morning at the R.M. Palmer Co. plant in the borough of West Reading. Tower Health spokeswoman Jessica Bezler said that eight people were taken to Reading Hospital Friday evening after the explosion.

    Authorities are currently investigating the cause of the explosion. A spokesperson from the Pennsylvania Emergency Management Agency told the Associated Press that a gas leak could have been the cause.

    West Reading Mayor Samantha Kaag praised the first responders in comments to the Reading Eagle. “A lot of the community came together — it was a lot of different companies that were there, a lot of different officers, our neighbors, the Reading police department and all of the firefighters that came together,” Kaag said to the local outlet. “It was a lot of people that knew what they were doing and they were getting their hands in there and they were getting it taken care of and handled,” her statement continued. “It was surprising how fast the response time was.”

    This candy factory is most well known for making seasonal candies such as Easter bunnies and is one of America’s largest and most innovative confectioners. The factory’s website states it has been open since 1948 and it has about 850 employees at its headquarters in West Reading. This is a developing story.”

    Video: https://justthenews.com/nation/states/pennsylvania-chocolate-factory-explosion-leaves-five-dead-and-six-missing

    Like

  5. “What’s with all these “trans women” acting like sadistic men? There’s no hate speech as virulent as the hate speech aimed at women by men claiming to be women”
    Mark Crispin Miller
    17 hr ago

    EXCERPT: “That’s one way to look at it. To me, it looks, and sounds, like something else. What those images don’t show is a “heated confrontation” between two contending “groups.” What they do show is one group violently menacing one person. More precisely, what the images do show is a woman physically intimidated, shouted down and forced to flee, under police protection, by a mob of angry men. That’s what we see here, and that is what the sound of all that angry bellowing makes clear, however her assailants may “identify.”

    No doubt there were also women (or, if you insist, “cis women”) in that mob, since many a “woke” woman all too readily accepts the notion that it’s (somehow) hateful to assert that men and women are not, biologically, the same, and that honoring the difference is essential to all women’s rights and safety. As I have written here before, there is nothing hateful in acknowledging that fact; yet those who do are vehemently slimed as “hateful”—when, in fact, it’s the “trans activists” (a different breed from most trans persons) who are demonstrably the hateful ones, as “thousands” of them just made clear in Auckland, and as others have routinely done all over social media. The charge that feminists are full of “hate,” and therefore pose a danger to “trans activists,” is, at once, a lunatic projection, and a propaganda trick, to make it seem (somehow) immoral to oppose, or even question, the transitioning of children (a trade worth billions), or allowing biological males to compete in girls’ and women’s sports, or admitting males to women’s shelters, and/or women’s prisons, or any other such misogynistic practice that it’s actually immoral to support.

    Below are several more examples of the virulence with which trans activists routinely menace women—and get away with it, since their hate speech is, somehow, perfectly okay. Such impunity is yet another indication that, unlike the fights for civil rights, women’s rights and gay rights, transgenderism—and the concurrent rise of “LGBTQIA+”—did not come out of any long and painful grass-roots struggle. Unlike those prior movements, this “gender movement” has come at us from on high—a topdown “revolution” driven by the same exalted interests that have stoked the “virus” terror, fostered “climate” panic, imposed “vaccination,” and are otherwise at war with nature and humanity.”

    https://markcrispinmiller.substack.com/p/whats-with-all-these-trans-women

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  7. Whoa……is this real or not??? First time I’ve seen this connected to the laptop….altho I didn’t scan thru all of them so…..🤨🤨😮😯😣😫

    “The big guy?”

    Like


  9. “The Great Pyramid of Giza’s summit. Never thought about that, didja?”

    “Sunday is the first day of the week for roughly half the world and Monday is the first day of the week for the other half.”

    Like

  10. “Norway leads the world with largest average breast size. The US only ranks fourth. These are real boobs – not fillers…”

    What do you call identical boobs? Identitties.
    What does it say in Mortal Kombat when you get killed by an exploding boob? Fatalititty.
    What is another term for boob sweat? Humidi-titties.
    What did one saggy boob say to the other? “If we don’t get the proper support, people will think we’re nuts.”
    How can ladies stop men from staring at their boobs? Eat a banana.
    What do boobs and Christmas trees have in common? When you see really nice ones, you can’t tell if they’re real or fake.
    What do you call a tattoo parlour offering a free tattoo to anyone who would flash their boobs? It’s their Tit for Tat special.
    What makes a dirty bus stop different from a lobster with boobs? One is a crusty bus station and the other is a busty crustacean!
    What kind of boob is a mathematician’s favorite? Quantitties.
    What is the similarity between boobs and legos? Both are for the kids, but the dads always end up playing with them.

    What consequences will we have when more money is spent on breast implants and Viagra than on Alzheimer’s research? By 2040, there should be a large elderly population with perky boobs, huge erections, and absolutely no recollection of what to do with them.

    How are boobs similar to the sun? Taking a quick look is fine, but staring is not. Then again, that’s what sunglasses are for.

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  12. EXCERPT: “If thinking people learned only one thing from the COVID-19 pandemic, it was that official government narratives are politically slanted and often untrue. In this latest HPAI outbreak, perhaps the most egregious departure from truth is the notion that the birds have died as a result of the disease and that euthanasia for survivors is the best and only option.

    First, of the nearly 60 million claimed deaths, perhaps no more than a couple million have actually died from HPAI. The rest have been killed in a draconian sterilization protocol. Using the word euthanized rather than the more proper word exterminated clouds the actual story. Euthanizing refers to putting an animal out of its misery. In other words, it’s going to die and is in pain or an incurable condition.

    Very few of the birds killed are in pain or even symptomatically sick. If one chicken in a house of a million tests positive for HPAI, the government brings full law enforcement force to the farm to guarantee all live birds die. Quickly.

    In not a single flock have all the birds died from HPAI. Every flock has survivors. To be sure, most are exterminated prior to survivors being identified. But in the cases of delayed extermination, a few birds appear immune to the disease. To be sure, HPAI is and can be deadly, but it never kills everything.

    The policy of mass extermination without regard to immunity, without even researching why some birds flourish while all around are dying, is insane. The most fundamental principles of animal husbandry and breeding demand that farmers select for healthy immune systems.

    We, farmers, have been doing that for millennia. We pick the most robust specimens as genetic material to propagate, whether it’s plants, animals, or microbes. But in its wisdom, the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) has no interest in selecting, protecting, and then propagating the healthy survivors.”

    https://childrenshealthdefense.org/defender/sick-chickens-influenza-outbreak/

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  15. we’re back!
    mom kept finding things she wanted me to do…and I couldn’t say no…lol
    the last thing she asked me to do was to clean out the old vacuum cleaner and take it upstairs. of course the dirt was clogged in there tight from no one cleaning it out for years…what a mess
    so I needed a bath as soon as I unpacked.

    THANKS for taking care of the bin all weekend!
    I appreciate it!!

    Liked by 1 person

  21. Feisty Hayseed
    March 26, 2023 12:41 am

    CDC Health Officials KNEW that Ivermectin was the cure for Coronavirus infections by 2015-16.

    DARPA knew since 2016 that Ivermectin was to be used as a first response for SARS like diseases. Yet Bob Malone chose to have a new, untested computer program re-run the trials that had already been verified over a decade and a half. He chose DOMANE, a brand new, untested… pic.twitter.com/nbmWkttkje

    — George Webb – Investigative Journalist (@RealGeorgeWebb1) March 24, 2023

    Like

  23. Jim H
    Jim H
    March 26, 2023 3:57 pm

    Nothing good can come of this:

    ‘Senate Republican leader Mitch McClownell said Saturday he has been released from the rehabilitation facility where he had physical therapy for a concussion caused by a fall earlier this month.

    ‘The 81-year-old Kentucky Republican said in a statement released by his office that he will work from home for the next few days.’

    https://nypost.com/2023/03/26/mitch-mcconnell-leaves-rehab-facility-after-concussion-therapy/

    When he finally turns up in public, will it be RealMitch … or a body double with no turkey wattle? Asking for a friend … 🙂

    Like

  24. Welcome back, Pat! Hope you had fun!

    EXCERPT: “After advising residents they may want to switch to bottled water Sunday afternoon following a chemical spill into a Delaware River tributary — setting off a buying spree that emptied store shelves across the city — Philadelphia officials said the city’s tap water would be safe to drink at least through Monday night.

    The advisory, which officials initially issued Sunday morning “out of an abundance of caution” in response to Friday night’s release of chemicals from a processing plant in Bucks County, was updated based on sampling results and new estimates of how long it might take water that entered the city’s Baxter Drinking Water Treatment plant early Sunday morning to make its way to residents.”

    https://www.inquirer.com/news/philadelphia-water-department-delaware-river-chemical-spill-20230326.html

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  26. Liked by 1 person

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