THE BOOK OF THE OTTER 



pointed to the fact that the otters left them pretty 

 much alone. 



A rather curious thing happened when we visited 

 the pond with hounds. At first the waterhens were 

 much in evidence, but after hounds had been at 

 work for an hour or two, we began to find dead 

 waterhens lying about. These were not killed by 

 hounds, but were drowned, and had practically — 

 as far as we could see — committed suicide. To 

 escape danger a waterhen will keep diving, and 

 the birds under discussion had evidently — owing 

 to the continual presence of hounds — done so until 

 they were tired out, and subsequently perished 

 under water. What made their behaviour stranger 

 still was the fact that there was a small covert 

 adjoining the pond, in which the birds could have 

 found sanctuary on terra firma until all danger was 

 past. 



Both dabchicks and waterhens devour fish 

 spawn, so otters do good by thinning out the ranks 

 of these birds. At times otters will take game- 

 birds, and there are authentic records of grouse, 



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