Otter!

Carole and I spent the last weekend at our annual family reunion in Bedfordshire and, staying with Carole's parents in Wootten, I was determined to catch up with my all-time favourite animal on the River Ouse just down the road: the Otter!

I was out late on Friday evening and early on Saturday morning, but finally caught up with what I think was a young Otter on Sunday morning. I first came across it just after 6.15am and managed to follow it as it slowly made its way downstream for the next hour - Wow!

At one point I was standing against a large willow when it came to within 2 metres! It was difficult to get good video but I've put together a few clips, including a very wary Mute Swan. I was videoing the Swan as the Otter approached wondering what would happen. In the end the Otter wisely swam to the other side of the river, and so the two don't appear together, but you can see the Swan looking upriver ready for action!


In the final section you get a brief glimpse of David Barnes who also turned up on his regular Sunday morning search for the Otters on this Kempston-Bromham section of the Ouse. You can see some of his great photos of the Otters on his Wild About... Blog.

Later I also met up with John O'Sullivan. We wandered through Maulden Wood looking for hoverflies which, unfortunately, were scarce in the cold wind. But I really enjoyed catching up and we did end the morning with a nice Adder!