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First visit
Feb. 27th, 2022 03:55 pmIt was 40 years ago today that I first set foot on Trinidad pier: a then-inconsequential event that ultimately changed the entire future course of my life.
From 1980-1982, I published a national newsletter that focused on the conservation of river otters. I wanted to write an article about otters in California, and the only person studying them at the time was a grad student at Humboldt State University. I'd actually met Kent Reeves at a research workshop in Florida two years before, so when I wrote and asked him if I could interview him for this article I was planning, he said come on up!
Kent of course had hoped to show me some otters during my stay, but when we visited his study site on Redwood Creek, none were to be found. On our way back, though, he made a side trip to Trinidad. He told me he hadn't seen otters here, himself, but several people told him they had, so let's give it a try. We drove through town and ended up at this fishing pier, and I thought to myself, this guy's crazy – this is the ocean – there won't be any river otters out here. (Shows you how much I knew about otters back then.) We stood and stared at nothing in the freezing cold wind for about 15 whole minutes before I told Kent I wanted to go. Big waste of time, or so I thought.
Anyway, at the end of my visit, I expressed disappointment that I didn't get to see any wild otters, but Kent said all that means is you'll have to come back this summer and we'll camp out on Redwood Creek and we'll see otters then for sure! I did, and we did! Long story short, only 16 months later, I was living in Humboldt, myself, and saw my first otter at Trinidad on June 6, 1983. Wound up studying wild otters and freezing my ass off in the wind here for 25 more years, so in the end, who was the crazy one? ;)
From 1980-1982, I published a national newsletter that focused on the conservation of river otters. I wanted to write an article about otters in California, and the only person studying them at the time was a grad student at Humboldt State University. I'd actually met Kent Reeves at a research workshop in Florida two years before, so when I wrote and asked him if I could interview him for this article I was planning, he said come on up!
Kent of course had hoped to show me some otters during my stay, but when we visited his study site on Redwood Creek, none were to be found. On our way back, though, he made a side trip to Trinidad. He told me he hadn't seen otters here, himself, but several people told him they had, so let's give it a try. We drove through town and ended up at this fishing pier, and I thought to myself, this guy's crazy – this is the ocean – there won't be any river otters out here. (Shows you how much I knew about otters back then.) We stood and stared at nothing in the freezing cold wind for about 15 whole minutes before I told Kent I wanted to go. Big waste of time, or so I thought.
Anyway, at the end of my visit, I expressed disappointment that I didn't get to see any wild otters, but Kent said all that means is you'll have to come back this summer and we'll camp out on Redwood Creek and we'll see otters then for sure! I did, and we did! Long story short, only 16 months later, I was living in Humboldt, myself, and saw my first otter at Trinidad on June 6, 1983. Wound up studying wild otters and freezing my ass off in the wind here for 25 more years, so in the end, who was the crazy one? ;)
