BRITISH MAMMALS 



it is seldom seen except when hunted, and will often frequent a stream 

 without its presence being detected. 



The Otter usually lies up during the day in his holt or retreat, 

 which may be under a bank, in a hollow pollard tree by the stream, 

 or merely a dry bed among reeds or bushes, whence he issues towards 

 nightfall to prey on various kinds of fish or on frogs. Eels form a 

 large and favourite part of the Otter's diet, as well as salmon and 

 grilse, while on the sea-coast numbers of flounders are caught in the 

 shallow pools at the mouths of rivers. Occasionally small mammals and 

 birds are eaten, 



I have only once seen an Otter abroad during the day, when one 

 passed close to me as he made his way along the banks of a rocky 

 burn in Sutherland. 



When an Otter enters the water no sound or splash will be noticed, 

 as the animal has a wonderful power of silently gliding under the surface, 

 leaving nothing more than a ripple and a chain of air bubbles to mark 

 the spot where he vanished. Even the speed of the salmon is not sufficient 

 to save it, for the Otter will persistently hunt a fish in the pools of a river 

 until the latter is exhausted, when it is easily captured and brought ashore 

 to be eaten. The prey is often left on the bank with nothing more than 

 a bite taken out of the shoulder, and in former days, when Otters and 

 salmon were plentiful in Scotland, people used regularly to visit the likely 

 spots on the banks of rivers to obtain what the Otter had discarded. 



Charles St. John, who knew its habits intimately, says {Wild Sports 

 and !}(atural History of the Highlands^ 8th ed. p. 115): "They appear 

 to go a considerable distance, generally hunting down the stream, and 

 returning up to their place of concealment before dawn. At certain 

 places they seem to come to land every night, or, at any rate, every 

 time they pass that way. In solitary and undisturbed situations I have 



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