International Giant Otter Studbook Husbandry and Management

nervous in behavior even during normal daily circumstances before the birth of this litter (i.e.
when not cub-rearing or exposed to new/unusual situations). In this regard and compared to
behaviorally and mentally healthy giant otters, they had abnormal personalities and unhealthy
behavior. In addition to the typical abusive reactions that giant otters are reported to carry out in
response to human disturbances, this pairs’ abnormal behavior and unhealthy mental state was
believed to be responsible for causing the excessive abnormal behaviors they exhibited. (They
certainly seem to be a compatible pair, so this factor did not have a negative impact on their
parenting behaviors.)
This pairs’ excessive levels of negative responses to human disturbances (i.e. stress) during cubrearing
and general unhealthy mental state (i.e. during normal circumstances etc.) was believed
to be caused because these animals' (the male was 12 years old and the female 10 years old at
the time this litter was born.) were housed in inappropriate enclosure conditions (i.e. insufficient
land areas and mostly all hard surfaces) for most of their lives. They had 12 out of their 13
litters in these conditions. In addition, the parents were not offered privacy from human
disturbances when they had most of their litters. Without privacy, they ate most of their cubs
soon after parturition and the remaining cubs were pulled for handrearing soon after their birth.
When they were offered privacy for a few of their litters and also lived in inappropriate
enclosure conditions they responded similarly with regards to their parental skills (as described
above) during cub-rearing, although the cubs lived much longer because privacy was offered.
They although were not able to carry out the essential stress-reducing land activities as
described above and in Section 3B, because the enclosure conditions did not allow them to do
so. They therefore did not have the opportunity to reduce their stress levels (e.g. as they did in
the appropriate conditions in the description above or to a further degree if they would have
been housed in appropriate conditions for a long term). This was clearly evident as when they
were not spending time with their cubs, they were much more nervous and stressed in behavior
than they were during the same occasions in this particular study. E.g. this pair would swim
pace (a stereotypical behavior) excessively in the water when they spent a normal amount of
time away from their cubs and this was when no disturbances occurred. The litter reared and
described in detail (during this particular study) was the first litter, of their 13 litters, that the
parents reared cubs in appropriate enclosure conditions. This pair had only recently been
exposed to appropriate enclosure conditions just before the time of this litter’s birth, therefore
they were only in the very early stages of recovering from their mental and behavioral (as well
as physical) health problems. Additionally, inherited thyroid malfunctions due to severe
inbreeding were likely to have prevented the survival of all of the cubs born at this institution.
This pair had 13 litters/28 cubs and even the multiple handreared cubs died with the same
symptoms as the parent-reared cubs (note: many were eaten soon after birth). It is expected that
this breeding pair will never reproduce successfully. It is possible that these parents could have
sensed that their offspring were not healthy and not able to survive and their abnormal behaviors
during cub-rearing could be at least in part, due to these reasons as well. E.g. parent birds with
hatchlings/nestlings will throw unhealthy offspring out of the nest to their death, because it is
not worth it to expend the extra energy to rear offspring that will not survive.
It is believed that because of all of the aforementioned problems and because so many litters
have been treated the same way, these old parents have become so ingrained in their abnormal
behaviors during cub-rearing that they actually performed them with/without appropriate
enclosure conditions, as a matter of a learned routine/parenting skills. The firmly ingrained
learned parenting skills/routines of these old otters most likely can never be changed/corrected.
It is amazing that previous litters survived up to 21/2 and 3 months old in the care of these
parents (i.e. this was when privacy was offered). This pair has not had any further litters since
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