64 How River Otters Will Save Our Rivers Christian Cline Lontra Canadensis, more commonly known as the North American River Otter, is quite the unique mammal, as they have gone through quite a rich and complex history throughout their time in the Midwestern United States. Events like the numerous large-scale fur trades in the 19th and 20th centuries lead to their numbers rapidly decreasing, to the point that they were considered endangered for most of the 20th century in Illinois. However, the environmental movements in the 1970s lead to the revitalization of river otters across the state and tracking the history of the river otter in the state can provide insightful information on the historical health of these rivers, one of which being the Fox River. The history of the river otter in Illinois is a telltale sign that ecological river improvement is possible in Illinois, and it is, therefore, essential that we continue to protect, maintain, and observe river otters residing along the Fox River, as they can also help us understand how to better protect, maintain, and observe the Fox River itself. River otters can be characterized by their slender, dark-furred bodies with only gold highlights on their face and chests. Found across all of continental North America where there's water, river otters seldom prefer human involvement, and yet still are quite social in nature, and can often be seen diving into the water and sliding around on mud or ice for seemingly pure entertainment. Some of the earliest documentations of River Otters in Illinois described seeing them slide down “otter slides” or “smooth, worn down pathways on the sides of banks and streams” and writers have seen them “sliding down these places much as a boy enjoys sliding down a hill in
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy Mjg3OTMy