A wildlife center west of Sacramento is expecting a speedy recovery for a river otter brought in Friday morning after the male was hit by a car.
The young river otter suffered no broken bones or fractures in the strike in Vacaville, but had an abrasion on his chin and suffered swelling around his brain, Solano Wildlife Rescue & Education Center founder Amy Pedrioli said in an interview with The Times.
The center’s veterinarian believes the otter should be well enough to be released into the wild in seven to 10 days.
At the moment, the 15.5-pound river critter is on pain medications. He needs to be off the meds for at least 72 hours before he can be released, and he also needs to start displaying normal, wild behaviors, including aggression.
“He needs to show us that he can eat and be an otter before we can let him go,” Pedrioli said.
The wildlife rescue center has never received a live river otter before, Pedrioli said, though they did get two otters last year that had died. The road where the otter was injured crosses several waterways that the animals often use, Pedrioli said.
North American river otters live in rivers, lakes, streams, marshes and on seacoasts, according to the conservation group River Otter Ecology Project. They eat crustaceans, birds and fish and grow to be up to about four feet long and 32 pounds. River otters are not to be confused with sea otters, which live in the ocean, bays and harbors and can grow to be up to five feet and 100 pounds.
River otters were hunted by the thousands for their pelts in the 17th and 18th centuries, according to the Sacramento Zoo’s page about the animal. Now, they are threatened primarily by human encroachment.
Their largest concentration in California is in the Suisun Marsh, just south of Vacaville. The animals are most active at night and sometimes travel multiple miles to get from one body of water to another.
