J Scott Shannon

I saw a otter at Trinidad yesterday evening! First time in just over 8 YEARS! (And it's actually the first time I've even seen the ocean in almost 2 years, despite me living only a thousand yards from it.) Got to watch the otter for about 40 minutes. Young male; I'd guess 3 years old. He did just about everything I'd expect to see an otter do in a typical session, including pooping on someone's boat. ;) Of course, I had no idea who he was, except judging by his young age, he would probably be a member of the third or maybe even the fourth generation born after the last group I studied there. How time doth fly.

Anyway, it certainly was an evening to remember! Might have been my last sighting ever, who knows. Can't count on a 'next time' for anything in this world anymore...

 

The dock is gone as of today, so my 25th summer season here is now officially over. It wasn't so bad overall, despite the fact that I saw otters only 33 times - my least number of sightings in the past 21 summers. We did lose one otter - Chirper/Mystery Male - but as I said here previously, I don't think he died, I think he just quit Trinidad and went back where he came from. Chirper's vanished before and returned, so this is not out of the ordinary for him.

The high point of the summer, of course, was Mother's sudden and totally unexpected appearance. Her presence filled me with a sense of anticipation I hadn't felt in a long while. I only saw the new family on 7 occasions, but every time was a tremendous thrill for me. And fortunately, not once did I see Mother bring her pup anywhere near the pier. That's bad for me as an observer, but staying away from Man is definitely good for them. I hope for their sakes that they maintain that wary distance in the years to come.

 

Saturday evening I saw two fresh scats on the dock that were deposited by two different otters at roughly the same time. That suggests Slick has returned. The male I saw had wear consistent with a 5-year-old individual. Putative Slick also did something I've never seen a male do – he used what I call "The Girls' Entrance" to halfway crag – which was also the last place I ever saw Slick's mom, Scoots. If both males had been out I would've known for sure that The Kid was back, but I don't imagine it will be too long before I have a 100% assured ID.

I haven't seen the new mother since 5/30, but that's not unusual. It's common for moms to move their pups around from den to den before they finally settle in somewhere. I'm hopeful that there is actually more than one pup in this litter. When I saw her, the new mom's lower abdomen was already visibly paunchy, so she may actually have 3 or 4 pups on the teat at present...

 

Went to Trinidad yesterday evening for the first time in a week. My dog loves our outings to the pier, so I went for him, mostly. I've also missed feeding my crows and Candy, the pier cat.

Anyway, there were 4 scats in the same spot on the northwest corner of the floating dock that weren't there last week. The scats were all small, and looked to be successive days old, probably from just one individual who is only passing through the harbor, not living here. None of the paths to the dens showed evidence of use, though the rubbing area at New Crag did show signs of recent activity. (Getting a good daily dirt bath may be what this individual is coming here for.) The only otter I ever saw use that rubbing spot was Chirper, so I'm betting the "visiting" otter is him.

You might think I'm worried about Slick, but I'm not. Reason being, he didn't show up here until the first week of June last year, so I suspect he's just doing the same thing now. If I had to guess, I'd say he's hanging around Nova, wherever she's gone (probably back to her birth area, wherever that was).

So I do think all 3 of the otters are OK, they just aren't here regularly anymore. I'll still come at least once a week to check things out, but until I see scat evidence that proves there is at least one otter in regular residence at the harbor, it's not worth coming more often than that.

 

Last night, a reliable witness reported seeing a serious, prolonged fight involving 3 otters. After about a minute of fighting, 1 of the 3 fled. He said this took place about 10 days-2 weeks ago, which would be shortly after I last saw Slick and Nova together.

From what he described, this sounds like a territorial expulsion attack, or a battle between males over an estrous female. Could this have been the two males fighting over Nova, or was Nova herself the object of the attack? I've seen the latter happen before, when 2-year-old Little Junior was savagely attacked by the resident adult males and expelled from the Clan when she reached breeding age.

I wish I'd been there to see the aggression, but apparently it happened about 9:30AM, which is a time I'm never at the pier...

 

I finally got a relatively close-up look at the new kid in town yesterday evening. It is definitely a yearling, and a small one at that, which reinforces my hope that it is a female.

The only things about yesterday's observations that dismayed me were, 1) that I didn't get a good view of its face when I had the opportunity, and 2) I lost the otter in plain sight when it was directly in front of me. I'm afraid that, since I see otters so infrequently these days, I've virtually lost my "eye" for tracking them. Not good...

Anyway, up 'til last night, I was thinking of taking the entire month of February off, as that month is typically the worst of the year for seeing otters, but if the newcomer is a regular resident now, it would be foolish of me to take any time off.

 

Mystery Male is a mystery no longer. I know who he is now. There's really only one possibility - Mystery has to be old "Chirper," the last survivor of the Funny Brothers who immigrated here beginning in 1998.

Although I initially thought he was a complete stranger, the mystery male from the start displayed an unmistakable familiarity with the bay. He was also very much at ease here, which is totally uncharacteristic of a true newcomer. But still, this obviously older otter was absolutely NOT a resident here in 2005. There were only two males in residence that year - Slick, and the yearling I called Spook - the youngest and last of the Funnies.

There was a possibility Mystery Male could be Complainer - Little Mama's only male offspring who survived to adulthood. Complainer would have been 10 years old in 2006, which was about the age Mystery appeared to be. But it couldn't be him. For one thing, Complainer had a faint but noticeable mark under his nose that was becoming increasingly darker with age. Mystery Male, however, has a completely plain muzzle. Additionally, Complainer had a blunt tailtip like his elder sister, Scoots. Mystery Male's tail comes to a sharp point.

So, given the fact that this apparently strange elder male was completely "at home" in the bay, he had to have lived here at some point, but who other than Complainer could he be? He could only be one of the Funnies. There were four Funnies altogether: Little Beady, Chirper, Buck and Spook. Little Beady was killed right before my eyes by a fisherman at the pier in February 2002. Buck and Chirper both vanished in 2004, and Spook wasn't seen again after the end of 2005. Buck had a distinctively curly tail like old Giant, but Mystery has a normal tail, and Mystery was far too old to be Spook. So there's really only one possibility remaining. Mystery Male must be Chirper. I don't know where he was for the year-plus that he was gone, but Chirper is definitely back to stay now.

 

I saw 3 otters this evening! One is an obvious newcomer, and judging by relative body size, it looks to be a yearling. I could not confirm the gender of the stranger, but it wasn't obviously male. I'm so excited! This is an unusual time of year to see a new immigrant, but I've come to expect the unexpected from these crazy otters of mine...

 

A couple of days ago, I received a second-hand report that someone had just seen a dead otter on a beach in Trinidad. I was informed that the carcass was on the launcher's beach east of the pier, but when I went to investigate, I found nothing on either the launcher's beach or the small beach by the restaurant.

Two other reports of a dead otter were received in email soon after, though, and those directed me to the actual site of the carcass: Trinidad State Beach. This is a popular recreational seashore located some distance north of the pier, and it was there that I found the carcass earlier this morning.

I knew the minute I saw the otter that it was not young Slick; it was definitely a more mature male. That pretty much means the dead otter has to be Mystery Male, and closer inspection of the carcass confirmed my initial speculation. The otter's much-eroded dentition essentially matched what I'd seen on MM in life. The clincher was a long, deep area of sloughed skin on the otter's left hind foot. On October 1, I had noted the presence of an identical wound on Mystery Male's left hind foot, so seeing this in combination with the characteristically-worn teeth has made me confident of my identification...

 

Yesterday evening, for the first time this summer, I actually got to take some photographs. Otters have been such rare sights this season, and it seemed whenever I'd see one, I'd spend most of my time just trying to figure out exactly who I was looking at. (I've got to get an accurate ID before I take a picture, otherwise the photo has no informational value.) Anyway, last night, I id'ed Mystery Male right away, so when he came up on the dock, I finally got to take his picture. So, at last, here he is!



click image to enlarge (340KB)


Not a very good angle, but it was the best I could get.