But instead, I held back and listened to the conversation, thinking back to ten years ago or so when I first saw river otters in the ocean. Color While sea otters use their two webbed hind feet and tail to propel them through the water, the four webbed feet of river otters are what enable them to swim efficiently. It has the greatest body length of any species in the mustelid family, although the sea otter may be heavier. All these parts working together make the sea otter … In this phase, a rapid increase in population can be attributed to an adequate population size, and an abundance of resources. The greatest difference is in their bulk, as the largest male mink only weigh a little over 1.5kg, while otters average 7-12kg and can be even heavier. The FWS estimated southern sea otter abundance in 2016 at 3,272 individuals, a record high since 1972. The 2017 count declined somewhat, to 3,186 otters, but still exceeded the potential delisting threshold for a second straight year. These are river otters. Motherhood © Size. This makes up for its lack of blubber in the cold Pacific water. The giant otter is clearly distinguished from other otters by morphological and behavioural characteristics. (20 kg) in weight. Figure 1: Sea otter population measured off the coast of Vancouver Island. This is due to all the air trapped in its fur, and also to its large lung capacity, two and a half times greater than other animals its size. He’s trying to climb up the pipe!” It was then that the explainer in me wanted to jump in and say, actually, no. Males are between 1.5 and 1.7 m (4.9 and 5.6 ft) in length from head to tail and females between 1 and 1.5 m (3.3 and 4.9 ft). They are moderately sexually dimorphic. The northern sea otters can weigh as much as 100 pounds. Sea otter have loose skin, very little body fat, and no scent glands. It is made up of a waterproof top layer and a short underlayer, which can contain as many as one million hairs per square inch. Adult southern sea otters are approximately 4 feet (1.2 m) in length. A sea otter! (1.8-2.3 kg). The southern sea otter is the smallest marine mammal in North America at up to 4 feet (1.2 m) long and up to 50 pounds (23 kg) for females and 70 pounds (32 kg) for males. A sea otter’s pelt is the thickest of any mammal. This too happened in the sea otter population, as they experienced an average rate of change of over 19% per year from 1977 to 2004. They have 7 cervical, 14 thoracic, 6 lumbar, 3 sacral and 20-21 caudal vertebrae. The size of the California (or southern) sea otters is about 4 feet. Finally, river otters can dive to around 60 feet deep, whereas sea otters, remarkably, can dive to several hundred feet to forage for food. The sea otter can hold its breath up to five minutes underwater. Size. Sea Otter Lifespan: The lifespan of the male sea otters is about 10 to 15 years while the females live for about 15 to 20 years. Size: Mink are about the same size as ferrets, which makes them significantly smaller than otters, with a length of 30-45cm and a tail of 15-25cm on top. Even a baby sea otter can stay warm on the open ocean, but they do need some help from their mothers. The sea otter has a very buoyant body. South America’s marine otter — Lontra felina — is the smallest marine mammal in the world. Adult males average 65 lbs. (29.5 kg) and adult females average 45 lbs. Their appetite for these invertebrate species exerts a strong influence on prey size and number and how they live and move in their habitat. A newborn southern sea otter pup is a buff color, 22 to 24 inches (55 – 60 cm) in length and 4 to 5 lbs. I, too, assumed that sea + otter = sea otter. Males can exceed 45 kg (99 lb) and 148 cm (57 in.) in length and females can be 32.5 kg (71.5 lb) and 140 cm (54.6 cm) in length. The males of this subspecies weigh around 65 pounds while females are 45 pounds in weight. 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