How can you measure a prey item that is being consumed by a sea otter? You can't take it and physically measure it, you are just watching them eat it. But size is an important factor to know about when looking at foraging ecology and how much energy they are deriving from their prey. Well, sea otter researchers have come up with an ingenious way to measure things that can be comparable with any other location - which is very necessary when wanting to compare between regions. They use sea otter paw widths! This is one of the fun new things we learned while reading this study on sea otter foraging ecology. We also learn more about how Washington sea otters are different than California and British Columbia sea otters, and why that is important when discussing and comparing diets, energy intake and population growth between regions. Come and learn about how good Washington sea otters are at eating kelp crabs (compared to the other locations) and what implications that has for differences in foraging ecology and population growth between these regions.

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Paper is available here: https://bioone.org/journals/northwestern-naturalist/volume-104/issue-1/NWN20-07/RAPID-CONSUMPTION-OF-KELP-CRAB--IMPLICATIONS-FOR-SEA-OTTERS/10.1898/NWN20-07.short