A friend of otters

Jan McKelvey is helping otters to survive and grow in England. Experts believe that the number of otters in Shropshire is growing and is part of a national trend. Jan is manager of the Shropshire Wildlife Trust.

 
The Environment Agency said the animals were nearly extinct in the 1970s, but have made a remarkable comeback.
 
Otters are elusive creatures, but one sign of their increasing numbers is the number found dead by the side of the county's roads.

Jan said  the Shropshire Wildlife Trust now records up to eight otter road deaths a year. She continued, “Instances of otter deaths on roads were unheard of when I joined the trust in 1988. Populations are obviously healthy enough to sustain the loss."
"Bright future"
 
Experts believe one of the main reasons for the increase in otter numbers is the improvements in water quality throughout many British rivers and the banning of certain pesticides. An otter survey that investigated 3,327 rivers in England according to their otter population between July 2009 and March 2010, documents the ten-fold increase of otter occurrence within 30 years.

Jan said otters had a "very bright future" in Shropshire: "There's a big push from Europe to improve our water quality and really raise the bar, so it can only get better."
 
Staff at the trust send the bodies to Cardiff University, where researchers study the level of pesticides in the otters' fatty tissue.

Jan commented, “It helps to see what background levels of these organophosphates - that were responsible for wiping them out in the first place - how they are still persisting in the environment."

The comeback of the otter proceeds different within the country. East Anglia and the River Thames are documented to demonstrate the highest increase whereas rivers in the South East cannot yet report the comeback of the otter. Future assumptions predict their return within the next decade.