TRANSCRIPT
California sea otters have the densest fur of any animal on Earth, with up to a million hairs per inch.
Through the nineteenth century and into the early 1900s, that unique pelt made them the target for fur traders who almost hunted them into extinction.
“In fact, on this coastline, it was thought that they were extinct, California coastline. In the mid-30s a remnant population was discovered just off of Big Sur of about 50 animals and by that point, they technically were protected under federal law. And so that remnant population over the last 80 years has gone from about 50 animals up to 3000.”
That's Brett Long, senior director of the Aquarium of the Pacific.
Now, his team has partnered with Monterey Bay Aquarium in another fight for otter survival - this time to save stranded pups.
Every year, around 10 to 15 otter pups are found stranded on the California coastline, separated from their mothers by wild weather.
The new aquarium partnership aims to pair the baby otters with surrogate mothers, in the hopes of returning them to the wild.
Sea otter program manager Megan Smylie explains there's some things an otter can only learn from another otter.
“Once they're 8 weeks and beyond they will be eating solid food and can dive and forage a little bit better - not all the way but a little bit better - and that is where an introduction to a surrogate mom should happen because that mom is going to teach them all of the behaviors that we cannot teach being people. They need to learn from otters and that is the best way to do it, is to pair it with an adult female. That adult female will start to mimic behaviors that the pup should learn, will help it groom, will help it forage, will help teach it prey manipulation, how to open up shells and anything that they would need to know that humans are unable to teach them.”
Otters are crowd favourites at zoos and on the internet, known for their wily tricks and tendency to fall asleep holding hands.
But while they may be cute, Brett Long explains they are predators that play a crucial role in the ecosystem.
Boosting their population numbers is also about protecting California's coastline.
“Sea otters are ecosystem engineers and so they're a keystone predator in their near-coastal environment so basically what that means is that they are a critical sort of predator in that system that keeps herbivores like sea urchins in check, so that sea urchins don't overpopulate and take out kelp forests and eel grass beds, as an example.”
Megan Smylie agrees.
“This is super important because if those populations get out of control, then the sea grass and the kelp ecosystems, they get destroyed and those are incredibly important ecosystems. They create biodiversity, they create protection against climate events and it is an incredibly powerful tool in carbon sequestration.”
So how do these little predators stay warm in the freezing ocean waters?
Mr Long explains they burn an enormous amount of energy, fuelling an "inner furnace" by constantly eating.
And, they have expensive tastes.
“As an individual, they eat about 25 percent of their bodyweight per day of seafood or restaurant-quality seafood. So we have an animal that weighs about 45 pounds that's eating about 10 to 12 pounds of food per day.”
Ms Smylie says the cost is immense.
“To feed them every day - sorry, for one year, every otter is about 40,000 [[US]] dollars. That is a bill that the aquarium fronts themselves and so we are constantly doing fundraising and when guests come the aquarium and visit, a portion of those proceeds come to support these conservation programs.”
But, as Mr Long explains, it's worth it.
“This is a bigger purpose. This is a higher challenge. So we invest and we invest a lot but we've all now learned and appreciate, boy, you see that juvenile otter survive out in the wild. That feels incredible.”
