How to attract an otter to your woodland

If you've got woodland next to watercourses, water bodies, lakes etc, tributaries, there are some great things that you can do to help encourage otters. I'm Lee, I'm an ecologist, I'm also founder of South Wales Otter Trust. South Wales Otter Trust helps monitor otters across Wales and try and help them with their diverse habitat requirements and population numbers. Our Eurasian otters that we've got here in the UK have got quite large territories, but we estimate that their ranges will be somewhere between 5 and 20 kilometres. Now this can include a huge variety of different habitats that they might utilise to help them in their quest to find food and also with their reproduction side of things. Now, how do you attract an otter? So this splits into two different parts. We've got the bankside vegetation, it's very very important to otters and other wildlife because it gives a form of shelter, it gives a form of connectivity for them to be able to move around, but also it provides shelter and shade for prey species that otters like to feed on. The type of trees we'd want to plant along our watercourses would be a mixture of species, alder, elder, willow, those sort of thirstier plants do better on the bankside. Root systems go very deep, they'll often grow into very mature trees which will overhang the river and they provide an ample habitat for multiple species, but particularly otters. The other part of the woodland that we can look at is just off of the bank line. Now this is also really important for otters because it gives that continued connectivity but it also allows for resting places to be able to have access close to a river where they can feel secure. So this mixed species of woodland that we've got here and slightly further off of the bank, as you can see there's some hazel here, hazel is absolutely great, willow's moving in and then we've got a lovely big bramble thicket up there. Bramble thickets are like a fortress for an otter. The other areas up the bank, let it go wild, let it do its own thing, otters will find it and make use of it. It's also important to try and keep these areas that you would want an otter to use away from footpaths that might be used. So we're almost looking at creating some wildlife zones for otters. Ah, here we go. Okay, so a good way of being able to detect otters presence is by their spraint. So spraint is basically their faeces. It's kind of a face book for otters. They leave spraint in different locations and these send different messages to other otters. So this is kind of like updating your status on a regular basis. So here we've got some spraint that's about two to three days old, bearing in mind it's quite warm so they dry out quite quickly. And this is one of the key indicators, but they're very, very good at hiding it. Really important to try and stay in cover when you're looking for otters. Break up your outline as a If you happen to see an otter, please remember that this is a protected species under the Wildlife and Countryside Act and the Conservation of Habitat Act. It's illegal to disturb them. If you see one, stop, enjoy it, maybe move away. If the otter sees you, it will disperse naturally, but please give them the time and space that they deserve as one of our elusive wild animals. So another way of being able to detect presence of otters is by their footprints. I'm lucky enough to have found some here, a small trail coming out of the river, going along the bank there and then heading back into the river, which is typical of otter hugging the sides of the bank so they keep hidden. They are five-toed animals like the other mustelids. This looks like a front print because it's a bit more smaller and a bit more compact, and this one looks like a back print because the back pad is slightly more elongated. And then you can see if we count one, two, three, four, five toes. Sometimes if the foot sinks in enough, in between the toes you might see the webbing, because otters have got webbed feet. If you ever come across what you think are otter prints, please always put something to scale, your keys, anything you've got that can give an idea of the size. So the otters are really shy and will stay hidden away. They're really elusive, but one thing they can't hide is their footprints after them, so it gives us an indication that they might be around. Now you might not see signs straight away that an otter is utilising the area that you've created for it, but give it time, give the area time to bed in, any works that have been done, to actually settle. And you never know, you might be lucky enough to come across one utilising the hard work that you've done.