94 



NORTH AMERICAN FAUNA 68 



flipper. As soon as she was released, he rushed to her side and then followed 

 her to the water. After a dive of about 50 meters, the two came up. The pup 

 immediately clasped his mother about the neck and she pulled him toward 

 her with her forepaws. This was a healthy, energetic pup. 



Fright during capture may temporarily upset the normal be- 

 havior of a pup towards its mother (Field notes, 27 March 1962) : 



Today we captured in the same net a mother with a large pup as they slept 

 beside each other on the cobble beach at Rifle Range Point (Amchitka Island). 

 After the net was placed over them, they both began to struggle violently 

 and the pup attacked the mother, biting her wherever it could. The mother 

 paid little attention to the pup except that when its head came near hers she 

 attempted to grasp the back of its neck in her teeth — as if to carry it off with 

 her. We removed the pup from the net and tagged it. It was released about 

 2 feet from the struggling, still netted mother. It rushed to her and bit her 

 on the side in several places. The mother ignored the bites and struggled on 

 with the net. After tagging, the mother was released. As she ran to the water, 

 the pup followed her. The mother swam rapidly for about 100 m., then stopped 

 and the pup surfaced beside her and put its forepaws around her neck while 

 both looked back at us before swimming out together — their fright appar- 

 ently forgotten. 



ATTENTION TO DEAD YOUNG 



Mothers were occasionally seen carrying dead pups. I watched 

 a mother carrying a dead, watersoaked pup while she emerged 

 from the water and rested on kelp-covered rocks. For nearly an 

 hour she licked the water from the pup's pelage and groomed its 

 fur with her forepaws. When it was fluffy and dry, she went to 

 sleep with it on her chest. How long a mother will attend a dead 

 pup is not known but one was observed in which patches of skin 

 and hair were slipping from the body, indicating that it had been 

 dead for several days. A dead pup was removed from beside a 

 sleeping captive mother after she had carried the carcass with 

 her for 31 hours. On several occasions we attempted to take dead 

 young from mothers seen resting on tidal rocks. Mother otters, 

 however, are wary and in each instance, the mother escaped, 

 carrying the carcass with her. 



Although mother otters carry their pups beneath the surface 

 during escape dives, they normally leave the young one floating on 

 the surface when they dive for food. Dead pups, however, were 

 carried by the mother while food diving. Unanswered questions 

 are : Did the pup die because the mother carried it while diving for 

 food? or did the mother carry it to avoid its loss because the fur 

 became watersoaked causing it to sink after the pup died ? 



