326 Notes on Otters. . Pee F i353 
eight inches long, terminating in soft, round paws, while instead of 
having hind legs like a land otter it has seal-like flippers, but unlike 
the seal the otter has a round tail about a foot long, covered with 
beautiful fur. 
In color otters vary somewhat. The young are a rich brown; 
from this they change, in the adult animal, intoa deep, glossy black, 
the more valuable skins being sprinkled with long white hairs, giv- 
ing that silver-gray appearance which is so much prized. As they 
grow older the white hairs predominate, so that some of the largest 
skins will be grizzled gray ail over, lighter on the belly and darker 
on the back. The skin is very loose, lying almost in folds, so that 
from an animal but little over three feet in length comes a skin 
which easily stretches to six feet and over. The fur is very thick 
and beautiful, and nearly an inch long, and has no full covering of 
thick, coarse hair, as in the case of beaver and land otter skins. 
Mr. Damon, who lives on Damon’s Point, which is the north spit 
at the entrance of Gray’s Harbor, once caught a young otter which 
had wandered into the bay and become stranded ona sand spit near 
his house. He brought the little fellow home, provided him with a 
tub of water, and gave him all the care possible, but during the night 
he escaped from the tub and was found dead in the morning. 
I also saw a cub that was killed by the Indians at the Quinault 
Reservation. It was brown all over, and the skin was worth about 
fifteen dollars. 
_ Their principal food consists of clams and crabs, but they doubt- 
less catch some fish also. They obtain their food by diving for it 
right in the edge of the surf, and it seems as though the heavier the 
breakers the more they enjoy the sport. When they catch crabs 
(which seem to form their principal diet), they come to the surface 
of the water, and, floating on their backs, place the crabs on their 
breasts and proceed to tear them to pieces with their short fore paws. 
The Indians also claim that they carry their young in the same man- 
ner. Many of the larger skins have a worn spot on the breast owing 
to its constant use as a table. Z : 
There are some large beds of kelp a few miles off the coast, and 
on these the young are born, usually two in number. Owing to the 
fact of these animals living all the year round in the cold waters of 
the North Pacific, the fur seems to be just as good in the summer as 
. it is in the winter, 
