During a weekend of wild weather in coastal California with 20% of our annual average rainfall in Monterey falling over the past three days in a one-two El Nino storm punch, nature continued on in the coastal waters as a pregnant sea otter hauled out on the rocks in the Monterey Bay Aquarium open ocean tide pool and gave birth to a pup on Saturday afternoon, March 5, 2016.
Monterey Bay Aquarium open sea tide pool with sea otter and pup by rocks.
This is the second time in three months that a sea otter mom and pup have taken refuge in the aquarium’s tide pool. Yesterday morning I visited the mama sea otter and newborn pup while they were still hanging around the Monterey Bay Aquarium.
There are fewer than 3,000 sea otters on the California coast. The mama otter who came to the Monterey Bay Aquarium is a wild, untagged sea otter. The tide pool is open to the sea and the mama otter can leave at anytime with her pup. The absence of food in the tide pool means they will need to leave the aquarium space soon for mama otter to feed.
Exciting stuff happening in Monterey Bay around our small town this weekend.
The sea otter birth can be seen in an edited video on Monterey Bay Aquarium’s Facebook page. Join the 1.7 million viewers of this special California event.
