Hi guys, I'm digital anchor Brandie Smith
like so many of you seeing this video
of otters swimming in Buffalo Bayou.
It brought a smile to my face so I wanted
to learn more about otters living in
Houston and about Buffalo Bayou itself.
So today I spoke with Kevin Hodge.
He's the general curator at the Houston Zoo.
I also spoke to Simone Leonard,
who's the communications director
for Buffalo Bayou Partnership.
How cool is it to see otters
like frolicking around?
In Buffalo Bayou, it is
absolutely fine.
It is great to see them because they're
pretty rare to see in the Bayou,
particularly this close to downtown.
They live in the Bayou, but they
don't come out and play too often,
so it's kind of exciting to see.
It's not often that we see otters,
you know, right here in Houston.
I think that was the general response.
A lot of people were just shocked that
there were bye bye you otters, but that's
that's where they live, right? Yeah,
that's where they live.
In fact, these otters that live here.
The same ones that you're going to find
in down throughout much of the United
States and they're kind of absent right
in the middle part of the United States.
But the eastern part of Texas has otters,
and so does Louisiana.
And going all the way over to Florida,
we just don't see him very often.
They're they're not in
that grade of abundance,
and they do a pretty good
job of hiding from people.
And so most of the time they go undiscovered.
OK, so as cool as it is to see
that wildlife, you gotta remember
that the wild component there.
Yes, so otters are wildlife.
They are natural predators,
so it's cute and cuddly as they are.
It's really important to give them space.
You know. Don't pick them up.
Their teeth are sharp,
you don't want to get bit.
And another thing is keep
your dogs on leashes.
You know you don't want your dogs
to get into a run in with an Otter.
It may not turn out the way you think,
so keep your dogs on leashes.
Give them space.
Don't touch them.
Take pictures from afar.
You can take video,
they're very playful but
just remember their natural
predators and they eat.
Meet new
people can always take their chances.
Trying to spot the otters out in the wild,
but they can get a guaranteed
sighting at the Houston Zoo.
Yeah, otters are incredibly
hard to spot in Texas.
They do a good job of avoiding people,
but if you come here to the zoo,
we have three of the 13 species
of Otter that you can find.
So we have the North American Otter,
which is the same species that we're
finding that was on the video in Houston.
We have the giant river otters
that come from South America.
That's in our brand new pots and all section,
and then we have one of the smallest,
the little otters, the Asian small,
clawed Otter that's in the
natural encounters building,
so all of those are.
Definitely some of our favorites for guests
that are here 'cause otters are very,
very active and it's fun to watch
them swimmable in their habitat.
They're not
the only wildlife that calls the Bayou home,
they're they're actually a lot of animals
that we might not see there are. You can see
turtles. We can see ducks.
Of course, everyone knows about our bats.
There are rabbits.
There are all kinds of fish,
even saltwater fish that swim
up into the Bayou. Texas is a
fantastic place,
and it's you'll always be amazed at
the number of wildlife that you'll
find in areas that you least expect it.
Like I was talking about earlier.
You could find porcupines in Texas.
You could find Ringtails we're working
hard to save several unknown Texas
species like the attwater's Prairie
chicken and the Houston toad and sea turtles,
and you don't think of Galveston
of having seats.
Are there are sea turtles right
there in Galveston,
so the zoo is working to
save those to make sure that
we always have sea turtles,
Houston toads in
Atwater parade chickens in the wild.
Where are some of the best
opportunities for people to see this
wildlife around the Houston area?
Is there anywhere they could kind of?
Keep an eye out.
Yeah, going definitely
going to your State Park.
So Brazos Bend is one of my
favorite parks to go to where
you could see loads of animals,
including the alligators
that are just right there.
And that's just South of the Texas
area but also Armand Bayou is
another great place to to go to the
Arboretum here in Houston and just
getting out in nature and exploring
the the bayous and and walkways.
I love that a lot of it is paved.
You know their sidewalks.
To go along it,
and so often on my lunch break,
I'll go out and kind of walk
along the Bayou and it's amazing.
The fish that you'll see right
there going right along the Bayou.
So there there's habitat there for
him and as long as we're keeping
the waterways as clean as possible,
animals will survive in this area.
So one of the things is you're
going out if you set up a goal of
I'm going to pick up five pieces of
trash every time I go out near a
waterway or the Bayou they need clean.
Water in order to survive,
so that will definitely help.
And then at the Houston Zoo,
we've done a great job with
eliminating single use plastic,
so the plastic bags and plastic bottle
straws just by taking a simple step
like that keeps it out of the water way.
'cause these otters definitely
need clean water to survive,
so it's up to us now to make sure
that that water is clean as possible.
How does the Buffalo Bayou
partnership work on that?
So we have some really excellent park staff.
The maintenance team they go out
and they keep along the Bayou.
They keep it well groomed one and two.
They actually help pick
up a lot of the trash.
It's on the banks and then we have
a cleaning green team that goes
out and they clean up on the water.
We have this really cool bio back that
vacuums trash out of the water and so
they go in and they take all kinds of stuff.
They've taken couches,
they've taken pillows,
they've taken all kinds of things.
Out of the water, things that animals
choke on and are really a hazard to them.
So we have teams that go
in and they help clean up
too, but we can't do it alone and
I feel like too often we sort of
view the bayou's as you know,
flood control a lot of times that trash
receptacle and forget that it's it's
home to lots of different animals.
Lots of animals, and I'm sure you've
probably been out to a wallbridge before,
but the amount of bats that we
have in the area is just unreal,
and so it's good that it provides
home for lots of these natural
animals that occur in this area.
We opened up Texas Wetlands a few years
ago and we do bat monitoring here at the
zoo and very quickly the bats moved in.
They found out this was a good place to be,
and we're picking up several
different species of bats here,
along with the dragon.
Flies and birds.
The waterfowl that kind of
moved into the area too,
so it's one of those that if you
build it they will come type of thing.
Well, and I bet the Houston Zoo is a
great place for people to learn more
about species native to the Houston
area. It yeah it is.
It's a great place to come and not
only for the animals that we have that
live permanently here at the zoo.
We have loads of great animals
that visit the zoo also.
So the wetlands that I was talking about.
It's not uncommon that you're going
to see herons and egrets out there.
Black bellied whistling ducks that
come in out there and then a host
of other invertebrates and bats.
That all make the Houston Zoo
their their home.