Oxbow Bend photographed by Terry Irwin

Gum-Smackers

in the Wilderness

by

Terry Irwin

Denver Confluence Writers

For as much time as I’ve spent in both Yellowstone and Grand Teton National Parks, a mammal I haven’t seen in years is proving pretty elusive. It’s not that I haven’t seen one. I did, once, years ago, on the north shore of Yellowstone Lake, but I am beginning to give up that I will ever see one again. I even ask for suggestions from a seasonal ranger who tells me in his twelve years working in the park, he’s never seen one, which, okay, makes me feel the tiniest bit better.

But now, I am standing on a tangled hillside, four feet above the Snake River admiring the black, Double-Crested Cormorants on a distant sandbar at Oxbow Bend in Grand Teton National Park. Having positioned myself at an isolated spot, I am a bit miffed to hear someone nearby break the silence with truly the loudest gum smacking I’ve ever heard.

Yet, looking around, I see there is no such offender. Below on the river, however, are the concentric waves from something that has ducked back into the water. Waiting for the possibility it might resurface, I watch capillary rings continue to widen. The cormorants waddle from the sandbar into the river. A lone Great Blue Heron glides gently over the inlet. Eventually, there’s no trace of any water disturbance here.

I’m quite certain whatever was below me has gone when up pops a North American River Otter, one capable of holding its breath for four minutes. In its shiny paws, it clutches a five inch fish. The otter tears into it, chews with such open-mouth gusto, that in our close proximity, I mistook the sound for someone smacking their gum.

Otters range in length from 22” to 32” but it’s hard to determine the size of this one. All I can see is its head bobbing in the center of steel-blue ripples. When it curl dives, just the shimmery midsection is visible. Finally, the long, narrowing tail which they use to steer appears, accounting for a third of its total body length.

The otter continues to amuse, rolling and swirling beneath the water. It emerges three more times, always with a fish, then peels off in another direction until I can no longer follow it’s trajectory.

Not even five months later, John and I round the same curve at Oxbow, catching sight of three distinct otters! Already far from shore, we see the direction they seem to be headed, so at the pull off, we do a U-turn, turning west on onto a gravel road. To reach the river’s edge, we traverse on foot, scratching our way through dry, waist-high grasses scattered with purple thistles. John sets up his camera tripod on the sandy ledge as I’m jostling to a lookout, a short distance from the shoreline. 

The river is so wide here, it could be mistaken for a lake. The expanse makes it difficult to spot the otters. Equipped with sensitive whiskers, River Otters navigate dark, murky waters for their main fish diet, but also find amphibians and crawfish.

What eventually aids in spotting their dark, half-circle heads on the water, is the brilliant reflection of a hundred golden aspen trees glowing behind them in the sunlight. Their appearance is short. Too soon they are gone altogether and I can’t find their wakes anywhere.

By now, other people gingerly approach our location along the river, having sacrificed their legs to the itchy thistles. Most of them gather near my big guy with the impressive camera equipment. A woman and man my age stop within whispering distance of me. They ask, so I quietly relate that it’s been six, no, closer to seven minutes since I last saw the otters.

The river now is almost glass-like and still.

For a while everybody waits. Eventually, some in John’s crowd meander back to their vehicles. Another two minutes of silence passes. The man, no longer whispering,  says “Let’s go” as he turns and walks away.

She looks over to me as I implore her with my eyes to stay. “They were right over there. I think if you wait a bit longer, you might see them.”

The quandary is written on her face; either follow her husband or take a chance she still might not see them and he’d have been waiting for her. But she stays. Now both of us are scanning back and forth across the water, conjuring them to appear. 

As if by magic it works, because the otters appear swirl-diving merely twenty feet from our shoreline. I’ve never seen wild otters this close. This weasel species sighting is unique because River Otters are solitary creatures, rarely seen in family groups. 

Otters often snag larger fish, but instead of bobbing in the water, will carry them to land for better control, which is exactly what this two adult, one small pup, gum-smacking family does contentedly at the shore. The woman and I stand in smiles of solidarity. A few minutes pass and she waves goodbye, still smiling. I like to imagine her joyful face as she shares the otter experience with her husband waiting in their car.