VISIT SENECA PARK ZOO OTTERS

BY LORI BRUTON

May 31st is World Otter Day. Zoos around the world celebrate their otters. Rochester’s Seneca Park Zoo celebrates the whole weekend, with talks, demos, and videos throughout the days. Enjoy enrichment behind the scenes and check out the fundraiser for the River Otter Ecology Project. Watch as a zookeeper puts a canvas with paint next to it and uses food to incentivize the otters trekking through the paint to create a unique painting as the keeper slides the canvas under them.

Donato DiRenzo, Seneca Park’s Communications Coordinator, coordinated a meeting with General Curator David Hamilton and Zookeeper Catina Wright. Hamilton began as a zookeeper working with primates at the Knoxville Zoo. He then became a carnivore keeper and started working with otters. A er that, he took the position as Studbook Keeper, managing the population and tracking the family tree and locations of North American River Otters for the past 24 years.

Most of Seneca Park’s sta have degrees in life sciences, such as biology or zoology. Zookeeper, Catina Wright, has been at Seneca Park for 18 years, ve years as a volunteerthenjoinedthezookeeper ranks a er she earned her bachelor’s degree in biology. Every two years there is an otter keeper workshop, exploring vet care, diet, enrichment, and enclosure types and exhibits.

Otters are motivated, food driven, and highly intelligent. ere are seven di erent subspecies of otters. Ashkii and Sailor are the two living at Seneca Park Zoo. ey have di erent personalities. Ashkii was born in 2016 and came to Rochester from the National Zoo in March 2020. She is at once skittish, cautious, and very energetic, always swimming and playing.

Sailor was born in 2007. He came to Seneca Park in May 2012 from a private facility in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina. He is more laid back and adventurous. Sailor was named in honor of a previously nauticalnamed otter, Admiral. e average life expectancy of an otter is 12 years, but Admiral lived to age 21, which is comparable to a human living to 100.

Watching Ashkii and Sailor in their element is exciting. Otters need enriching activities. Seneca Park includes a wide variety of enrichment, including hammocks, swinging baskets, and hollow logs. As we chat, Wright tosses sh encased in ice cubes in the water. e otters eat mostly sh, mackerel, herring, and salmon. Occasionally, they get ounder, tilapia, clams, squid, scallops, and so shell crab. ey also eat other meats, fruits, vegetables, and hard-boiled eggs. Otters are carnivores but eat some produce, preferring vegetables over fruit.

is super red compared to other animals that are pinkish. Otters have special kidneys because they’ve been in marine habitats. It helps them deal with salt water.”

Otters don’t have a blubber layer like marine animals. eir coat is double layered, keeping air trapped in the hairs, insulating them from getting wet. eir skin isn’t necessarily wet when they are swimming because they have outer guard hairs and inner u y layers.

Hamilton is involved in otter breeding and transfer plans. ere is a signature Species Survival Plan (SSP) for North American River Otters. is information prevents inbreeding by knowing who is who and where otters are from. Gene diversity is crucial for breeding.

Researchers perform genetic studies of the otters to help otters survive and avoid extinction. North American River Otters in Western New York almost disappeared due to predators and hunters encroaching on their habitat. ankfully, the Department of Environmental Conservation and Seneca Park Zoo supported otter repopulation.

Seneca Park Zoo featured the otters in a viral Earth Day recycling video (youtube.com/watch?v=7DyxQD0oBao), in which they trained to put newspaper and bottles into recycling bins to help show people to recycle and not trash rivers. It helps everyone, including otters, when we clean up the environment and be careful what goes down storm drains.

Check out Ashkii and Sailor and the other animals at Seneca Park Zoo at 2222 St. Paul St., Rochester.

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