For those of you who like cute fuzzy things or have little ones who like cute fuzzy things, one of the sea otters at the Seattle Aquarium just gave birth to a pup. It was born early Saturday morning. There is some information and a picture of mom and pup below and more pictures and videos on the Seattle Aquarium's facebook page, if anyone is interested.
The pups grow pretty quickly, so if you are looking for something fun to do in the next few weeks, I would highly suggest visiting the little guy. I haven't seen the new pup myself yet, but plan on making a stop in this weekend.
For those of you who don't know much about sea otters, here are a few interesting facts:
Aniak, the mother, is the daughter of Lootas, who is also at the Seattle Aquarium. Lootas came to the aquarium as a young pup herself when her mom was accidentally killed by a boat.
Unlike river otters, sea otters can live their entire lives at sea. They are born, eat, and sleep in the water.
Although pups can float, they spend much of their puppyhood on mom's stomach, while moms grooms, feeds, and teaches them to hunt.
Once they are grown, sea otters are in nearly constant motion cleaning and grooming their fur. They keep warm by keeping air bubbles trapped in their fur. If the fur gets dirty, they will loose their protection against the cold sea water. This is why oil spills are so dangerous to sea otters - if oil gets in their fur and they can't clean it off, they quickly become hypothermic.
The AZA recently stopped all sea otter breeding programs in zoos and aquariums to leave the space open for injured or abandoned wild otters, so being able to see a brand new pup is pretty unusual (this one was a bit of accident).
I hope you get a chance to see the new pup!
I might be going with my daughter tomorrow to see her....or to a museum. We haven't decided yet for sure.
