The Haunts and Habits of the British Otter. 15 



same mother in company is, so far as I am aware, 

 an unknown experience, though two adult bitches 

 and two adult dogs have been frequently " put 

 down " together. The older a dog Otter, the more 

 likely he is to be found leading a solitary exist- 

 ence. Otters, therefore, are not gregarious, though 

 there is an isolated instance, well authenticated, of 

 four bitch Otters with their families having been 

 met in the early morning travelling overland from 

 some small stream to the tidal estuary of a larger 

 river. This occurred in Cornwall, and is recorded 

 in the Badminton volume on ''Hunting" on the 

 authority of the late Mr. Trelawny of Cold- 

 rennick, and others. 



The holt of the Otter may be a drain with its 

 entrance either under or above water, or in the 

 hollow roots of an old tree on the banks of a 

 stream or lake — an alder is a favourite tree for 

 this purpose — or it may be in an old rabbit burrow, 

 or among cairns of stones, or under a pile of rocks 

 or heap of brushwood ; but it must be ready-made 

 to his hand, for the Otter does not dig or burrow 

 like the badger, the fox, or the rabbit. Messrs. 

 Harvie-Brown and Buckley, in ''A Fauna of 

 Argyll," describe an " Otters' home " in the Island 

 of Soay with great minuteness. This, they appear 

 to think, was entirely the work of the Otters them- 

 selves; but in the mosses of Cumberland there are 



