Anne Elliott's photos with the keyword: Otter

My plan, when I took this photo, had been to crop it to get a somewhat better look at this animal, but I rather liked the fence in the foreground and so I left the image the original size. It's a poor quality shot anyway, so the animal would have been too blurry. This is the animal that friends, Cathy and Terry, and I watched two mornings ago, around 6:30 a.m. (!) We had barely begun a day of driving into the mountains (Cathy really wanted to try and find a Grizzly Bear and Moose to show me), when Terry suddenly spotted this "something" far, far in the distance (32x zoomed). We have ruled out anything even remotely similar, and have concluded that this just has to be a Northern River Otter. Is there someone "out there" who could positively confirm our ID - or, of course, correct it? It would be so much appreciated, especially as Otters are so rarely seen here. What a way to start a day that turned out to be so enjoyable and rewarding (despite no Grizzlies or Moose, lol)! If anyone happens to be interested in hearing about what else we saw that day, I put a longer description under the Mountain Sheep image posted yesterday.

This is the only photo I have of an Otter - and unfortunately it was taken at the Calgary Zoo : ) Taken through very dirty glass and snapped so quickly when the animal climbed out of the water for a couple of seconds. The original was so blown out, almost totally white. Amazes me what can be brought out of an image when so little can be seen. I am assuming that this captive animal is a Northern River Otter (Lutra canadensis). "Otters have never been abundant in Alberta. Moderate numbers still occur throughout the boreal, northern foothill and Rocky Mountain natural regions." www.srd.alberta.ca/BioDiversityStewardship/WildSpecies/Ma...