Excerpts from the current issue of The River Otter Journal

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A baby California sea otter found weak and starving on a remote beach in Santa Barbara County has been nursed back to health at SeaWorld.

 The orphaned otter was about 5 days old and still had her umbilical cord attached when she came ashore July 21 [2007] at Jalama Beach. Wildlife officials don't know why the pup was abandoned by her mother. 

Animal care specialists at SeaWorld, a marine-themed park in San Diego, are nurturing the female pup 24 hours a day. They're bottle-feeding her a rich, milk-based formula. 

The pup has gained about a pound since she arrived at SeaWorld. She now weighs 3.85 pounds and measures 19 inches long.

 

 

My husband John and I were privileged to tour the Wild About Otters exhibit at the Monterey Bay Aquarium in September 2007 with Karen Jeffries, the aquarium’s public relations manager. The exhibit, featuring all 13 otter species found throughout the world, adds an exciting new dimension to the aquarium’s previous emphasis on their cousins, the sea otters. Karen and the staff have become captivated by the river otters on display and are already aware that they will miss them when the exhibition closes in September 2010. The staff, caretakers and visitors, young and old alike are enamored by the river otters’ energy and crowd pleasing antics. The interactive educational panels emphasize the conservation message of preserving otter habitat and the importance of clean water in lakes, rivers and oceans. 

The exhibit begins with a dynamic display on the similarities and differences between river otter and sea otter. Visitors wind through five special connected galleries, encompassing over 7,000 square feet, featuring the African Spotted-necked otter and the Asian Small-clawed otter habitats. We watched the pair of African Spotted-necked otters, Denny and Neema, with their two pups, play with plant fronds and folic in the water – all racing around their enclosure at amazing speed.

 

 

River otters have become reestablished in Nebraska after their reintroduction in the mid 1980s and early 1990s. The species is currently listed as threatened in Nebraska. Despite the high profile of the reintroduction and the otters’ role as a flagship species, relatively little is known about river otter ecology in Nebraska. The Nebraska Cooperative Fish and Wildlife Research Unit with the Nebraska Game and Parks Commission initiated this project in October 2006 with the objective of collecting home range and habitat use information on river otters along the big bend area of the Platte River using remote sensing (radio telemetry). GOALS: We plan to capture and radio-tag approximately twenty northern river otters on and near the Platte River, a core component of the species’ distribution in Nebraska. During the approximately one year long monitoring portion of the pilot project, we will collect data on daily and seasonal movements, home range, habitat use, survival, response to hydrological changes in the Platte, and relationship to abundance data from bridge surveys. These data, in conjunction with the results of an ongoing river otter health and reproductive survey and results from NGPC’s annual otter bridge survey, will help to close existing information gaps and contribute to the creation  of the Nebraska River Otter Management Plan an

 

In the spring of 1999, I had the pleasure of accompanying Dave Hamilton, Resource Biologist for the Missouri Department of Conservation since 1984, into the byways and wetlands of Missouri. For several days, we trekked around northwest Missouri conducting part of the annual intensive monitoring of river otter populations across the state. That was the start of a long and rewarding friendship. Then, like so many, I was devastated to hear of his sudden and unexpected death from cardiac arrest on September 8, 2007. Words are woefully insufficient to express the loss. My early impressions of Dave held true throughout all our years as friends and colleagues. He was a man generous with his time, his knowledge, his enthusiasm for life and nature. Dave was also a highly respected member of the national and international conservation community. He specialized in furbearer biology but had a deep appreciation for the natural world and life, as well. He was an avid outdoorsman and hunter. Among the many species of wildlife on which Dave led research and management activities, he was the national authority on river otter status, population management and restoration. His expertise was instrumental in the development of best management practices for humane trapping methods. He was an accomplished professional, scientist, and devoted family man. Part of his role working for river otter conservation included ongoing research, interfacing with sportsmen and hunters, participation in developing the federal regulation and oversight of the international trade of river otters, responding to otter damage control, and education. His work was crucial to the State of Missouri's river otter restoration project.

 

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