Diet and Eating Habits
Oriental small-clawed otters feed mainly on invertebrates such as crabs and other crustaceans, molluscs and amphibians. The hindmost upper teeth (pm4 and m3) are broad and robust and are specialized for crushing the exoskeletons of crabs and other hard shelled prey. They also feed on insects and small fish such as gouramis and catfish. They supplement their diet with rodents and snakes. Apart from crabs, the major prey items are mudskippers (Gobioidei). There is much seasonable variability in the diet. They hunt food by using their vibrissae to detect movements of prey in the water. They use their forepaws to locate and capture items rather than their mouths. Their incomplete webbing gives them a great deal of manual dexterity. They dig in sand and mud for shellfish such as clams, mussels and crab. To get at the meat they crush the shell manually or let heat from the sun force the shells to open.
Read more about this topic: Oriental Small-clawed Otter
Famous quotes containing the words diet, eating and/or habits:
“I learned from my two years’ experience that it would cost incredibly little trouble to obtain one’s necessary food, even in this latitude; that a man may use as simple a diet as the animals, and yet retain health and strength.... Yet men have come to such a pass that they frequently starve, not for want of necessaries, but for want of luxuries.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“There are no golden geese. There are only fat geese eating the food that could nourish more athletic opportunities for women.”
—Donna A. Lopiano (b. 1946)
“Though there are wreck-masters appointed to look after valuable property which must be advertised, yet undoubtedly a great deal of value is secretly carried off. But are we not all wreckers contriving that some treasure may be washed up on our beach, that we may secure it, and do we not infer the habits of these Nauset and Barnegat wreckers, from the common modes of getting a living?”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)