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| You can't see the otter - it's under the water |
Walking further up the bank, I noticed two further spashes, after which an otter poked it's head above the surface and swam along for a bit, just allowing a view of it's white front.
This isn't by any means the first time otters have appeareared in the Nith in Dumfries. One of the more amusing times was when an Australian lad, over here to play cricket, was out fishing in the river and reported that he had seen a seal!
Today went to pick up new trekking bike from Castle Douglas. Riding it home my thoughts were mainly devoted towards testing its speed and climbing ability, but still found time to spot a couple of red kites and a song thrush.
Just received this from Australia via Facebook:
ReplyDeleteRohan Kleem: Ha! Colin as I was reading this and thinking what a great shot of the Devorgilla bridge, I cast my mind to back to when I saw some unique nature in the Nith. When I told others, yep, it didn't go down that well. Mainly to laughter. But I saw what I saw, I promise - along with about 10 other people who were staring at it too. It was in a very high tide, where the water was almost over the banks into the Sands. And from this shot, it would have been just to the right, on the other side, late afternoon. Because the tide was so high and in the opposite direction to the flow, the flow of the river had seemingly stopped, and the whole Nith was just sitting stagnant. The weir pictured here wasn't visible and it looked like a big pond. And near the foot path on the other side, sat near the surface, one very baffled, relatively small seal. It looked in pretty bad shape to be honest, like some kind of lost baby, that had lost its way in the king tide and ended up God knows where, assumed from the river mouth many many miles away. It wasn't far off a big otter, but it definitely wasn't an otter. It was dappled, mainly light in colour, with a short shiny coat, had very big eyes, and that distinct seal nose that it would open and close. It wasn't swimming or fossicking about, it was just bobbing in the same spot, mostly upside down, pretty much resigned to its fate. Because I hadn't been in Dumfries long i didn't think too much of it, probably happens all the time. But when no one believed me, or thought it was absurd, I wish I had have got my camera. Oh well, the seal-in-the-Nith story continues. Ps here is something interesting about seals in Loch Ness: http://www.lochnessinvestigation.com/Seals.html