UKC

Last weekend a mate said ‘have you heard about that otter?  It’s been in a big garden pond on the outskirts of Wigan and feasted on £8k of koi carp and such like.  Check ‘ Shevvy News’ on Facebook - there’s trail cam footage.’’  So I did. And there is. It’s a big ‘un too.  Must have mooched it’s way up a small feeder stream that enters the River Douglas, which is a small stream but fish have recolonised since its naturally cleaned itself up. Brilliant. My grandfather lived in Cumbria all his life, spending huge hours fishing, and never saw one. 

I saw one in a store that runs through an industrial estate in Nottingham a year or so ago. Absolutely amazing!

There is a video of an otter in the Spar shop in Barmouth, summer of 2020. I kid you not. I'll try and find a link to the footage.

They love ponds with fish.  Otter heaven & fishmongers.

I lived in Eire and otters could often be seen in the day and were quite curious whilst canoeing on rivers.  

Best sighting in town?? I was working in Skibbereen on a walkway alongside the river in town and we had two otters fishing immediately below us about 6 ft away.  Somewhat spoilt the vision as we watched them root around in abandoned shopping trollies and various other bits of junk in the river.

I've seen them in the trent in Nottingham, I'd heard about them but didn't believe it. It seemed bold as brass swimming about and made my day. I just hope the fishermen don't give them a hard time.

Last year I saw otters in Holyrood park quite regularly and also deer almost every day.  This year nothing. One of the nicer side effects of the lockdown I guess.

I used to go fishing, a lot.  I never saw an otter for the first 25 years or so.  In the last 10 years I started to see more and more, all over the place.  The fishing declined on most of the rivers, all over the country, so I packed in fishing.

I think there’s a correlation between otters and fish populations but there are many other factors too.

First otter I ever saw was nonchalantly crossing the road through an industrial estate in Kirkwall, at about 1730 on a weekday.  There were several living on the estate at that time.  A friend had a family of them living in a pile of pallets outside his workplace.

Also at least one lives around the main pier, it’s spotted and filmed regularly by night shift workers.

There has also been a recent siting of an otter helping itself to the contents of a garden pond (ornamental fish) in the town

They seem to be pretty comfortable existing in an urban environment .

I live near a stretch of river (the Camel) where they are known to be present. I've never seen one. 

My son who works at a well known tourist attraction round these parts showed me a video from a camera trained on an ornamental pond there. Otter! Otter! I can't imagine there are many fish left in it.

The now banned pesticides in the 60s and 70s were tough on otter populations, they've been slowly recovering as river water improves.

Nearly ran a big one over a few years ago when it jumped off a wall in front of me while I was doing the late night drive up the Conway valley road, so glad I was able to stop without hitting it, would have been embarrassing after all the conservation work to get them back!

Ive seen them in the Ness

Regularly seen in the Wharfe at Otley. I had to wait ages, but finally saw on this year.

Often seen in the Water of Leith in Edinburgh.

Otters? They're so last year. The cool kids these days are into Beavers. You need to upgrade.