NOTES AND 
Tue following is quoted from Mr. Aubyn 
Trevor - Battye’s contribution 
on Otter Hunting to “ Lord 
Lilford on Birds.”* The ex- 
tract gives an excellent character sketch in 
few words of an interesting little mammal :-— 
Otters are great travellers, ranging very 
far up and down stream on their nightly 
quests. They swim very quietly, slipping 
into the water as if it were oil. Though you 
listen never so carefully, you do not hear 
much that tells you the otters are moving, 
excepting a sort of ‘“ whistled” call, which 
comes now and then from the reed-beds. 
Masterly as the otter is in the water, supreme 
as are its powers of swimming and diving, 
it no more cares for unnecessary hard work 
in its hunting than other animals. When 
going up stream, especially if the current is 
swift, it frequently lands, and often cuts the 
bend of the stream by travelling across the 
land from corner to corner. A _ practised 
eye will easily notice these spots where the 
otter lands and runs up the bank; for 
otters, like most other wild creatures, follow 
one another's lead. Causes 
which the blundering eyes of 
humans may not detect are 
no doubt answerable for the 
claims of one landing place 
over another. It may be the 
set of the eddy from a half- 
sunk willow stub, the angle at 
which the bank rises, the 
chances of cover and conceal- 
ment—any one or all of fifty 
points may determine the 
advantages of a particular 
landing place. But at all 
events it will, if otters are 
abundant, be paddled into a 
regular run. Here you will 
see the otter’s footprint in the 
mud, the prints of four round 
toes like no other creature’s 
track. his footprint is called 
Otters. 
Photo by the Scholastic Photographic Co. 
SHORT-CLAWED OTTER. 
COMMENTS. 
by otter hunters, the “seal.” Other signs, 
such as remains of digested food Gn hunting 
parlance “spraints”) will be noticed on 
hillocks of the grass or on stones which 
show themselves above the water. Although 
some streams are more favoured than others, 
there is probably not one in the country 
that is not visited at times by otters, and 
the attention of even unobservant persons 1s 
occasionally arrested by the spectacle of a 
pavtly-eaten fish lying on the bank. The 
otter first begins to eat those parts about 
the head, except when dealing with an 
eel, when it commences with the tail end. 
Because of its cautious and secret manner 
of life, an otter will often continue to 
frequent a stream for a long time, and be 
unsuspected. Indeed, many a stream has 
held otters from time immemorial, and yet 
no one has guessed this, until the coming 
of a pack of otter hounds has “shown the 
varmint up.’ Hyven that omniscient person, 
the dusty miller, in spite of his peculiar 
opportunities, was scarcely prepared to find 
in the thatch of his own outhouse one of 
its favourite sleeping-places. 
Yes, otters often choose strange 
quarters, and though their 
usual ‘“‘holts” are drains, caves, 
rocks, holes under tree roots, 
and withy beds, we have 
known one to frequent an ivied 
tree, and have bolted another 
from under a barn floor. 
Mr. Trevor-Battye has no 
easy task before him in con- 
fining within one volume of 
the Woburn Library a work on 
British Birds, but if it 1s writ- 
ten as interestingly and con- 
cisely as the above extract we 
can heartily congratulate his 
readers. Sir Harry Johnston’s 
1 volume on Mammals will be, 
ready shortly. 
* “Tiord Lilford on Birds: Being a collection of informal and unpublished writings by the late President of 
the British Ornithologists’ Union, with contributed papers upon Falconry and Otter Hunting, his favourite sports.” 
Edited by Aubyn Trevor-Battye, M.A., F.L.S., F.Z.S., etc., with drawings by A. Thorburn. 
1 vol., 16s. 
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