The plastic ball contains some delicious food for the North American river otters. The problem for Jet, the male otter, is that the ball is hanging from a chain. Removing his breakfast is no easy task!
In the wild, food is not served to animals in bowls. Zoos use "enrichment" techniques to make the residents solve problems and work for their meals. Therefore, they're behaving the way they would in a natural environment.
Pawsitively fascinating facts! Getting an up-close view of a sea otter's paws and feet can be hard for the average person, so senior animal care specialist Jocelyn kindly provided a better look for us with these photos. She also shared insight into the importance of otters’ paws/feet:
🐾 Sea otters have extremely dexterous paws, which allow them to find food along the ocean floor and use tools to crack open the hard shells they find. 🐾 Their claws are retractable like house cats' claws. 🐾 They use their forefeet/front paws to groom, forage, and eat but not to swim. 🐾 Often you'll see the sea otters sleeping with their paws and flippers out of the water. This helps them regulate their temperature and stay warm!
Today is the last day of Sea Otter Awareness Week 2025 and if you’ve been here for previous SOAWs, you know we have to include this video at some point - enjoy!
Remember the iconic video “Honey Badger Don’t Care”? Well, the hilarious voice behind the viral hit is back, but this time with an otterly important message to share for Sea Otter Awareness Week. Find out why otters aren’t just cute little fluffballs, but tough, tenacious survivors!
It’s here, it’s Sea Otter Awareness Week 2025! SOAW is “organized and sponsored by Defenders of Wildlife, Sea Otter Savvy, California Department of Parks and Recreation, the Elakha Alliance, and the Monterey Bay Aquarium,” and this year’s theme is “Anchored in Hope”!
Our 2025 theme, “Anchored in Hope,” provides a metaphor for optimism, stability, and security in a challenging world.
As a keystone predator, sea otters regulate the biodiversity and resilience of kelp forests by controlling populations of kelp-eating animals. They symbolize the interconnections that sustain life in nearshore habitats. However, we must ensure the future of sea otters so that they can continue to paddle the nearshore waters and fulfill their foundational role in coastal habitats.
Mismanagement of coastal resources and human-caused climate change have caused a dramatic loss of kelp canopy along the Northern California and Oregon coasts, creating systemic imbalances and reducing biodiversity and biomass. The prospect of reintroducing sea otters to these damaged areas—restoring this top predator to places where it has remained absent for as long as two centuries—could offer an unparalleled strategy for helping restore and renew coastal ecosystems. Sea otters remind us that we need an interspecies etiquette that compels us to coexist with the natural world.
Hope exists! We can moor ourselves to it the same way that holdfasts anchor kelp stalks to the seafloor or sea otters enfold themselves in kelp fronds to rest. Then, just like the sea otter in our 2025 logo, we might find ourselves anchored, connected, and secured rather than lost at sea. Hope serves as our active response for combating despair over climate change, environmental degradation, and the alarming state of the world. Defenders and our Sea Otter Awareness Week partners invite everyone to emulate the sea otters by anchoring themselves in hope.
Find the events calendar here and enjoy the sea otters this week!
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