It's a smelly old world

We humans have a poorly developed sense of smell so it is difficult for us to appreciate how important it is for most other mammals.  Mustelids, in particular, use scent to communicate with others of their kind, marking their territories and advertising their presence and breeding condition.  With the exception of badgers, female and male mustelids lead separate lives, usually meeting only for courtship and mating.  As they have large territories, are thinly spread across the landscape and are mainly active at night, scent-marking is a vital way for them to tell who is about and who is available.

Otter cubs are already leaving their own scent marks and sniffing others by the time they first appear on the cameras at three or four months of age.  The first video, from late 2024, shows two young otter cubs exploring their world, much more interested in the scents than the sights or sounds.

Otters use spraint (otter poo), urine or anal jelly to leave scent marks, choosing prominent features such as rocks and grass tussocks.  This is a new spot I have only just discovered.  The very first night after I set up a camera an otter turned up.

The next video shows a popular sprainting spot which is very regularly visited by the dog otter and (separately) by the mother and cubs - there is fresh spraint almost every time I look.  It was interesting to see it marked by a badger as well on this occasion - a behaviour known as "musking".

Badgers' family dynamics are rather different from otters' but they use latrines to mark their territories and they scent-mark each other to reinforce the clan smell and maintain family bonds. Here's an example with a mother repeatedly making sure her cub smells like the rest of the family, using sub caudal glands under her tail - a process called "allomarking".

Polecats are notoriously smelly to our sensibilities (another name is foulmart) but it obviously works for them.  The next video shows a polecat using urine, scat and body rubbing to advertise its presence and sniffing to see who else has been around.

The smaller mustelids are the more elusive they become.  Tracking weasels and stoats is very difficult so less is known about their territorial behaviour.  Field signs are usually very few but this weasel left a message inside my camera box.  It was also scent marking by rubbing its body along the entrance pipe as it went in and out, something that happens nearly every time.

OtterCam on Channel 5

Oh dear.  It's happened again.  On Channel 5 last night.  People like otters and television people like to show pictures of otters but why they also need a mumbling old man as well is beyond me. My main aim in making all my otter videos is to be able to share them so of course I said yes but it wasn't a comfortable experience.  After Winterwatch a year ago I was hoping it would be better - at least I didn't wear my dreadful old hat this time. 

The approach came from Lonesome Pine Productions, an independent TV production company based in Newcastle commissioned by Channel 5.  The team above (R-L) was Simon Glass, who was also cameraman for Winterwatch (but soundman as well this time), Alan Fairholm, producer, and Bunny, assistant producer.  Brian Rutter took the photos in this post.

Most of the time all I had to do was walk towards tha camera (I am quite good at that bit).

Simon also took a lot of drone footage, much of it general views of the reserve and some of me walking up and down (again).

The interview is much harder than it looks, mostly because I talk too much.  The editors need very short sentences so they can cut up the copy more easily whereas I tend to talk in paragraphs.  Added to that I am always thinking three sentences ahead so I don't lose my thread but then I do.  Fortunately very little of what we recorded was used in the end.  (If you think it was bad you should see what they left out!)

The programme was no 24 in a series of 40 on Channel 5 called Love Nature.  If you want to watch it you can see it on the Channel 5 website here.  I suppose if I got more practice at speaking in front of the camera I would get better at it but I hope that's my television career over.

The trail camera footage they used was some I have shown before in posts here and here.    To bring you up to date here is a brief clip of the family last Sunday.  You'll see the cub with the poorly leg is still limping but is able to keep up with the others.

Adders

The weather in the North East has been resolutely depressing so far this year, often wet and nearly always cloudy.  I guessed the snakes would be fed up with it as well so spotting sunshine in the forecast on Tuesday I headed north hoping they would be out basking.

This early in the season you would expect that most of the snakes would be males (they emerge from hibernation earlier) but the first one I saw was large and brown, so more likely to be a female.

The snakes hadn't yet shed their old skins so the males were looking rather dowdy.  Once they have moulted they will be gleaming black and silver but this is how they are now.

Here's another with a slightly greenish tinge.

I read that adders don't eat after emerging from hibernation until they have shed their skins but this one has a suspicious looking bulge which might suggest it had a quick snack.

While I watched it was tasting the air with its tongue.

The snakes spent an hour or two sunbathing, readjusting their coils every now and then, before slithering back into the undergrowth.

The site I visit is getting more overgrown each year.  The snakes don't seem to mind but it makes it harder to get a clear view for a photo.

Grooming and suckling on OtterCam

This is amazing.  In seven years of watching otters on my trail cameras I had never seen a cub being suckled until just over a week ago.  And now it has happened again - twice, and with two different cubs.  The cubs are now seven and a half months old, nearly full grown, and they should be independent in perhaps about 10 weeks time.  Last time the cub with a foot injury was the one suckling and I wondered if it might be for comfort.  The next time it was the injured cub again and I think mother was more interested in grooming herself and the cub.

The latest episode was with one of the others.  Mother had been grooming herself for about a minute before the cub turned up and the grooming and suckling went on for another two minutes.

The injured cub sticks closer to the mother than the other two who are noticeably more independent.  It will be fascinating to see how things develop over the next few weeks.

An injured cub on OtterCam

I feared the worst at one stage but this may not turn out as badly as I thought.  The smallest cub, presumably female, was limping badly two weeks ago with an injury to its right back leg or foot. In the first video you can see it lagging behind the others, wanting to join in the play fight and then getting upset when it all got a bit boisterous and one of them presumably trod on its poorly foot.

Two days later the cub appeared on the cameras on its own and could barely drag itself up the bank - a video distressing to watch that I won't post here.  I thought if it didn't manage to rejoin the mother and the others and couldn't catch its own food it probably wouldn't survive.  Later that night there was a video of mother with the two fit cubs and no sign of the third.

Since then, however, it has rejoined mother and at least one of the others on the videos and seems to be managing, although it is still limping badly.  Here is the cub with mother and one of the others.  The first camera was very fogged up.

And then something I have never seen before.  Otter cubs are weaned by 14 weeks of age and these three are now seven months old and yet mother was letting the injured cub suckle. Perhaps she senses the cub's distress and this was for comfort rather than sustenance.

Some good news is that the dog otter has made a fairly good recovery from his leg injury although it has taken two months.  Let's hope the cub does the same.

Stoats and weasels

I rarely see a stoat or a weasel in the garden but I now have three trail cameras set up to look out for them, one on my "weasel wall", one in a camera box and a third watching the base of a dead sycamore and adjacent low wall.  Since the start of the year stoat visits have been regular but fleeting, enough to show there is one around but not enough to suggest it lives here.  It doesn't go into the camera box but appears on the other two cameras.  Last week it briefly checked the base of the dead sycamore and then ran up the tree, disappearing from view - something I have seen several times before.  This time, however, it came back down after only 15 seconds carrying prey, identifiable as a vole in slow motion.  There is an old starling nest hole about 3m up the tree which is probably where the vole was, but why and how it got there, and how the stoat knew, is mystery to me.

Not to be outdone a weasel appeared on the same camera, checking on a delivery van before running towards the camera.

Most of the stoat recordings are on the wall.  Here is one doing what stoats do, although quite why is another mystery.

Although weasel visits are less common, one also showed up on the wall last week, not quite as frantic as the stoat.

My hope is that one of these will decide that the wall is a good place to make a nest and raise young.

Puzzles on OtterCam

I watch a lot of otter videos and most times I can understand the behaviour but this episode has me puzzled.  The cub is obviously in mother's bad books, perhaps because of something it said or did, and it seems to be being disciplined in some way.  Perhaps the mother didn't want to be followed but, if so, she gave in in the end.  I don't think I have heard this chittering sound from a cub before, only from an adult female when courting.

The dog otter has been carrying an injury for the last few weeks.  I first noticed it seven weeks ago, having not seen him on camera for a couple of weeks before that.  He was unable to put his left hind foot to the ground and was hobbling about on three legs.  There were no signs of wounds apart from a new scratch on his nose - so a fight injury is a possibility but this would be an odd one.  It is intriguing that there were what looked like wounds on a dog otter in early December.

From the look of it I first wondered if his leg was broken or dislocated but when he rolled around he didn't seem to be in any discomfort, although his leg was flopping in a very unnatural position. Over the weeks it has gradually improved as you'll see from the video but he is still limping.  I guess we'll never know the cause and I can't even be sure it is the same dog otter as before. There may have been a coup.

I only just missed a very close encounter last week.  Only three minutes after I left this character turned up to sniff the cameras, perhaps to check it had been me.  Maybe next time I'll wait a few minutes in case it happens again.