Orcasional Musings | Otters? Where?

||| ORCASIONAL MUSINGS BY STEVE HENIGSON |||

We were taking our usual walk, from the parking lot at North Beach, south on North Beach Road, west and then north around Sucia Drive, down through the gate to the Whale-Watch landing, and then through Smugglers’ Villa on the trail at the edge of “The Ditch.” As we came to the Ditch’s outlet into the Salish Sea, we saw a small, brown, pug-nosed face staring out at us from a crevice in the sea wall’s loosely piled rocks. As we walked closer, the lithe brown animal to whom that face belonged twisted smoothly around and disappeared deeper into the rock-pile.

It was a river otter, Lontra canadensis, who probably had a sett, and her kits, deep inside that crevice. Female river otters prefer to raise their kits (or pups) without the help of the guy who caused them, but they’re really good mothers. They have to be good, because those pups are born blind and toothless, unable to survive on their own for the next couple of months. Mom is probably pretty happy about the toothlessness part, since her children suckle on her, every chance they get.

There seems to be lots of river otters on Orcas, and you’ll see them if you’re keeping an eye out. There used to be a lone female, maybe occasionally with kits, in the rock crevices down at the ferry landing. You’d see her between ferry arrivals, as she swam out to look for food in the depths of Harney Channel. We haven’t seen her recently, but that may be because we no longer walk onto the inter-island boat. Now we just stay in our car while waiting to leave on the occasional Costco run.

Years ago, when we were much younger, a lot less achy, and a lot more motivated, we would take the three-mile walk around Cascade Lake a few times a week. One time, we were tramping past the rocky embankment between the boat rental and the first Midway Campground, when we noticed a car parked right at the lake’s edge, and a worried-looking tourist couple, standing and fidgeting next to it. So we stopped and asked whether we could be of any assistance.

The couple had stopped because they had seen four very small brown animals on the road ahead of them, and they didn’t want to run them over. Those four tiny animals seemed very frightened, so the couple parked their car in a way that protected the little brown lumps from other traffic. But then, to their dismay, the little ones immediately ducked under their car, and couldn’t be coaxed out.

We tried everything that the four of us could think of, but nothing worked. We made noise on the road side of the car, we very carefully poked sticks near them, we rolled small rocks toward them, but they just were not going to respond to any of our provocations. Instead, they just sat there, smelling strongly of feces and fish, and making little noises.

“What are they?” the tourist couple asked.

“We think they’re baby otters,” we replied.

After about ten minutes, a larger brown head popped up out of the lake and scanned the area. Her assessment of the situation seemed to convince her that we were no threat, either to her or to her kits, so she swam up and climbed the rocks, and then she wriggled under the car. We heard a commotion, and a couple of snarls, and then mamma otter emerged on the lake side of the car, a pup grasped by the scruff of its neck securely in her mouth. She scampered down the rocks to her sett hole, and she deposited her kit in it with what definitely sounded like a scolding.

Three more commotions under the car, three more scruff-grabbing trips, and three more admonishments, and all of her children were safe and sound. Mother otter then came out of her den and climbed to the edge of the road. She looked directly at the four of us, and it was obvious that she was telling us that it was OK for us to leave. The two nice tourists got into their car and headed off toward Olga or Doe Bay, and we resumed our walk. Momma otter watched us go, and then she dove back into the lake and swam off, probably looking for her dinner.