Comments

  1. Athywren - not the moon you're looking for says

    I can just imagine the otter beauty adverts now:
    “Maybe she’s born with it,
    Yes, that is the case.”

    Also, animalian reproduction is weird and scary, but also fascinating and kind of beautiful. But mostly weird and scary.

  2. karmacat says

    Wow. That was so much easier than a human baby being born. Damn those big headed babies…

  4. Saganite, a haunter of demons says

    Wait, are you saying I’m actively fighting against excellence by regularly shaving?

  5. blf says

    [A]re you saying I’m actively fighting against excellence by regularly shaving?

    Yes. The mildly deranged penguin also points out you do not wear a feather tuxedo, bowler hat and tutu, and so are not only a fashionista fugitive, but probably like peas.

  6. moarscienceplz says

    Uh oh PZ, you didn’t put a black bar over the otter’s naughty bits. Now the Catholics are going to yell at you.

  7. woozy says

    I must say it never occurred to me to consider those as “mustaches”. It still doesn’t.

  11. woozy says

    This has made me want to go read Ring of Bright Water again. And now I’ve just found out there are two sequels!

    I always be frustrated that those books weren’t the similarly named otter book Circle of Light. Very confusing to me…

  12. nahuati says

    Monterey Bay Aquarium Doing Good:

    Cool Facts

    •Sea otters have the world’s densest fur—up to a million hairs per square inch! (You have 100,000 hairs or less on your whole head.)
    •Sea otters live in loose-knit groups called rafts. Otters in rafts often sleep side-by-side, wrapped in strands of kelp so that they don’t drift far from each other.
    •Training and “enrichment” games keep our otters mentally and physically stimulated; they also make working with the otters safer for us and less stressful for them.

    and

    Saving Sea Otters
    Our Sea Otter Program has been studying the threatened southern sea otter since 1984 with the aim of understanding threats to the population and promoting its recovery. We rescue, treat and release injured otters; raise and release stranded pups through our surrogate program; seek homes for sea otters that can’t return to the wild; and conduct scientific research.

  13. screechymonkey says

    Excuse me, sir. I couldn’t help but notice that you have praised sea otters, and many cephalopods and other sea creatures, yet you have never had a kind word for sea lions….

  14. anym says

    Sea otter sex: not necessarily very nice at all. I’m not totally certain that the ‘tache makes up for it.

  15. Crip Dyke, Right Reverend Feminist FuckToy of Death & Her Handmaiden says

    Did you know they’re actually born with that excellent mustache?

    Yawn.

    Get back to me when they’re ambisexual, born pregnant, empathically project a satisfying joyful feeling of being well-loved, and lack an obvious face.

    Then you’ve got something, m’boy! We can even leave them near an unsecured source of triticale, if our genetic engineers haven’t come up with anything even better by then, and watch our supply take off at light-speed!

  16. Athywren - not the moon you're looking for says

    @Crip Dyke
    The ability to detect alien intelligence agents who have been surgically altered to appear human is also a bonus!

  17. Crip Dyke, Right Reverend Feminist FuckToy of Death & Her Handmaiden says

    @Athywren, #16:
    Doesn’t that require feeding them on food that’s 4x better for their unique, psychic metabolism than anything we have today?

    ….wow, even for me, that joke is nerdy.