Mukilteo Musings

I love to see wild animals--must've been my upbringing in Montana and my Dad always looking. Yesterday, the kids and I had just finished lunch and of course we are always looking out toward the water; we look out over the neighbor's back yard. Lucas exclaims, "What the H** is that??" "Is that a weasel?" Of course, I scream with delight and I do believe the creature heard me because he froze for a minute. It was an OTTER!! In the neighbor's back yard!! (Their unfenced yard has a steep drop off to a trail to the beach) We pull out the books because is it a sea otter or a river otter? There is a creek at the bottom of the ravine below our yards that eventually goes into the Sound. We decided it was a river otter because they are sometimes found in coastal waters. A sea otter, on the other hand, would not venture out of the salt water and wander this far away from shore. Anyway, I think he just loved our snow and was using the steep hill to slide and when the snow melted yesterday, he came up to the top of the hill to find out where it went--that is my theory.