sea+otter

=The Sea Otter =

//Enhydra lutris kenyoni is the scientific name of the sea otter. Sea otters can live up to 25 years of age, but the average life span is 10 - 12 years. Sea otter fur ranges from brown to almost black with guard hairs that may be silver, light brown, or black. As a sea otter ages, their hands and necks will lighten until almost white. Sea otter fur is the finest of any mammal, consisting of 850,000 to 1 million hairs per square inch. Sea otters depend on these hairs to keep them warm while in the water.Sea otters have long flat tails and since the majority of their time is spent in the water, webbed hind feet which are perfect for swimming. Retractable claws on a sea otter’s front paws allow the sea otter to grab food. Sea otters have round heads, small eyes, and visible ears. //  If a sea otter’s fur becomes soiled with foreign substances such as oil, the sea otter will not be able to keep itself insulated. Consequently, sea otters spend much of their time cleaning and grooming their fur. Sea otters mainly eat benthic invertebrates such as clams, mussels, urchins, crabs, and fish. They must dive to capture their food, sometimes up to 250 feet. Sea otters also use “tools” such as a rock to open their hard-shelled prey. Adult sea otters can eat 25 to 30 percent of their body weight per day in order to stay warm. Feeding is a very important activity for sea otters, and occurs mainly in the morning and afternoon. Sea otters are coastal, shallow water dwellers. Their habitat consists of two areas in these waters- the ocean floor where they find their food, and the ocean surface where they eat, groom, rest and social interactions occur. Sea Otters make lots of different noises to communicate.A baby sea otter will make a cry like a sea gull when it is left alone. Otters will whistle or whine when they are upset or frustrated, hissing or growling will warn predators to back off. The mother seal will"coo" when she is grooming her child's fur. Sea Otters eat cams, snails abalones, crabs, starfish, mussels, scallops, squid, chitons, small octopuses, sea urchins, prawns, sea cucumbers, limpets, marine worms, several types of fish and a variety of other things. Sea otters eat over 160 different things.

