Fitzgerald Lake Conservation Area - Otters in June (June 17 -- July 1, 2023)

During the mid-1800s, at the same time that Henry David Thoreau was noting his observations in Concord, Massachusetts, Northampton's Sylvester Judd was jotting down his own records in his journals, which are now at Forbes Library. For these two contemporaries interested in the natural world, the largest mammals they might have had the chance to see in the wild were foxes, muskrats, raccoons and occasionally otters. Of these, the least frequently seen were otters, as Thoreau describes in "Brute Neighbors" in Walden, or Life in the Woods (1854):
"It is remarkable how many creatures live wild and free though secret in the woods, and still sustain themselves in the neighborhood of towns, suspected by hunters only. How retired the otter manages to live here! He grows to be four feet long, as big as a small boy, perhaps without any human being getting a glimpse of him."
Nowadays, we have the chance of seeing many larger mammals than Thoreau or Judd would have dreamed possible, but Thoreau's words still ring true. And especially so with otters. Any day you see an otter in the wild is a good one.
During June two groups of otters were particularly active at this remote site within the Fitzgerald Lake Conservation Area. So much so that while other species passed the camera too, the otters were the stars. Here's a distillation of 15 minutes of otter activity in about 3 minutes. Enjoy!
#animals #wildlife #history #nature #northampton