How Otters Eat Fish
RArnebeck
I was missing anything. Several times I'd see fish heads left by otters on the
ice, sometimes five at once arranged neatly around a hole, then come home and
read "The otter eats a fish head first and discards the tail fin" (Cahalane) or
"Fish, frogs and snakes are eaten head first, possibly because this kills the
prey and makes eating the rest easier." (Stokes) And "otters will eat their
prey head first, and in the case of fish, will discard the fins." (Web page of
NY Otter Restoration Project.) The easiest way to dig deeper is to check the
11th edition of Britannica written at the beginning of this century and there I
read "When lying upon the bank, it holds the fish between its forepaws,
commences at the head and then eats gradually toward the tail which it is said
to leave." The article gave as a source Coues' History of Fur Bearing Mammals
in North America. I got to that on microfiche and in it there is one reference
to otters eating fish. The author, who admits to never seeing an otter, quotes
Sir John Richardson: "In the spring of 1826, at Great Bear Lake, the otters
frequently robbed our nets, which were under the ice, at the distance of a few
yards from a piece of open water. They generally carried off the heads of the
fish, and left the bodies sticking in the net." Is it possible that the notion
of otters eating the heads of fish and leaving the tail got into the literature
because they ruined Sir John's fish and chips by picking his net clean? I
assume the tails were stuck in the net (Sir John noted that he knew the fish
were in the net, that dinner was assured and that to keep them fresh he kept
them there.) Stokes does go on to say "It has been suggested that with larger
fish, otters may bite off the head first, and that this or other parts of the
fish may be left." They get this from Erlinge in Oikos 19:259-279, and he says
quite boldly with no maying about it, that otters bite the heads off large fish
(over 15 cm,) and discard it.
Very very rarely I have found a fish tail, usually a smaller fish and I got the
impression that the otter may have been interrupted by me while eating it.
Unless I am soon innundated with otter-leaving-the-tails reports, I will pursue
this injustice to the otter. I think animal guides began coming out at the turn
of the century. Anyone have a copy of Stone and Cram's American Animals?
Bob
Nancy Casurella
New York compiled by the Writers' Program of the Work Projects
Administration
in the city of New York and under Otters it says, "Fishes are grasped
between
the forepaws and ripped open with the help of the pointed teeth. Usually,
the
head is eaten first. In the last century, when otters were still fairly
common
throughout the United States, fishermen sometimes reported that, their nets
having been raided by otters, their entire catch was headless."
Peter da Silva
Scott Shannon <sha...@telnet.humboldt1.com> wrote:
>I should add that some otter species - like the Giant Brazilian Otter -
>definitely *do* eat most of their fish prey head first.
The video I've seen of that otter shows them starting just behind the head
and working back, thoough that was pirhana and I'd expect they'd give the
head of THAT fish a respectful burial. Bad enough to be biting your OWN
tongue...
--
This is The Reverend Peter da Silva's Boring Sig File - there are no references
to Wolves, Kibo, Discordianism, or The Church of the Subgenius in this document
"Twenty-two points, plus triple-word-score, plus fifty points for using all
my letters. Game's over. I'm outta here." -- Melissa ... by Kwyjibo.
William Croom-Johnson
Otters table manners -
In 1962 my family kept two otters (presumably wild) which my mother had
rescued from a Calcutta market. For two years we took care of them, in
the bathroom, balcony and roof of our New Delhi house.
During this time we noted that they invariably ate their fish head-
first, and we have plenty of Super 8 film showing precisely this. (Of
course, this does not necessarily mean that all otters do this, but that
at least some otters eat their fish head-first for long stretches of
time so long as they are being watched. (Cf the joke about the logician
in a train noting that there is at least one Scottish cow which is black
on at least one side.))
Incidentally they were highly intelligent, enjoying taps and plugs
enormously, but not smart enough to put a plug back in again once it is
out.
WCJ
--
William Croom-Johnson
Nancy Casurella
or rehab place? From what place do you hail with your otters? I
would get much better mental images if I knew where people were.
Where is R. Arnebeck who sees otters daily? On an island in Alaska?
Phoenix, Az
petier
<casu...@uswest.net> writes
Gestapo? :-)
There are a few of us on the group who regularly watch wild otters. I'm
sure none of us would claim possession of the otters we see so 'my
otters' means 'the wild otters that I watch regularly'. Apart from being
quicker to type it also displays affection for these wonderful
cantankerous riparians.
Regards, Petier http://secondrow.demon.co.uk
Lossiemouth RUFC Fixture Sec ICQ# 28188540
Want to sponsor us or give us a game? Email me - the address is valid.
RArnebeck
briefly once a month, maybe, in the wilds. If I'm very lucky I see them twice a
month. Two summer's ago I had the pleasure of seeing a family of four, in the
wilds, almost every day for about two months. My sightings of otters this year
last about three or four minutes. The ponds I visit are surrounded by bush and
well obstructed from many angles so if I see an otter, it generally gets a good
whiff of me. Otters seem emboldened by numbers, so the family of four tolerated
me. Single otters or pairs of otters move off. But by going out to the ponds
every day or every other day, I can usually see if the otters have been there
by their scats, troughs, tracks. Really "my otters" are these creatures of
imagination inspired by these signs as I try to visualize what they've been up
to. Actually I prefer not to see otters eye to eye. I want to see them be
themselves not see them confront me, as entaining as that can sometimes be. I
mentioned where I am in another post. But as for a mental image - I live in a
resort community which means for two months of the year the river is churning
with motor boats, for the rest of the year it is not bad. The interior of the
island is part state park. Half of that is set aside for camping and hiking.
The otters and I hang out in the other half which use to be trackless brush and
wet land until the beavers rationalized it all into some dozen beaver ponds.
It's a good place for watching mammals - deer, coyote, beaver, otter, mink,
muskrat, raccoon, procupine and fox. So even if I have a dry spell not seeing
otters, I usually have some entertainment. There is a photo of an otter I saw
in January on my web page hometown.aol.com/RArnebeck.
Bob