Hello Sea Otter Prey Observers! We have been getting some fantastic observations recently; thanks to new iNat user @seaotterchannel for rocking the project with some excellent photos of cool prey!

In a couple weeks I am going to do some house cleaning on this project, removing all additions of "sea otter". If you would like to continue to include your observations, please duplicate them, make an observation of the prey species, and add those to the project. Exceptions will be made in cases of really rare observations backed up by a credible narrative. Please message me directly if you would like to make a case for keeping your observation as is.

So far, all species in the project (save one) have previously been observed directly as prey by researchers in the past, although some are definitely on the "less common" end of the spectrum. The exception is https://www.inaturalist.org/observations/14533102, which has never been specifically identified before and, in this case, required hands on examination by an expert to verify. Of course this was cheating a bit, as the prey had already been eaten and was removed from the gut of a dead sea otter during a necropsy by CA Dept of Fish & Wildlife.

So keep on photographing those foraging sea otters, especially in the harder to get places like rocky coastlines, and remember to respect your subjects and avoid approaching so close you disrupt their important foraging. I am looking forward to many more cool submission in 2020!

Gena

First of all, thanks to everyone who has made contributions to this project and/or have tagged me on project candidate observations! I am amazed at some of the images you all have captured---well done!

When I first started this project and was going through all sea otter observations, it seemed too intimidating to ask each user to duplicate their observations with an ID in which they probably have limited confidence without my prodding . As they trickle in now, one by one, it seems less daunting to get each observation added in the way that best benefits the project and facilitates processing of data. I am still evolving my best technique for explaining this process, especially to new users. Any advice there would be appreciated.

For existing project observations: I'd like to ask help from contributors in organizing the project in a way that is more consistent with my original goals. If you have observations of sea otters that are included in this project (with prey listed as a field under "Eating"), I would be greatly appreciative if you could take the time to do the following:

1. Copy the sea otter observation and assign an ID of the prey (to the lowest possible taxon) to the duplicate. In most of the "sea otter" additions to the project we have already come to a conclusion on ID level of prey.
2. Add the new prey observation to the project filling out the field "Eaten By" with sea otter (whichever subspecies is relevant) and leaving blank the "Eating" field (so as to avoid implying cannibalism).
3. Remove the original sea otter observation from the project.

Here is a beautiful example: http://www.inaturalist.org/observations/3950966

A few of you have multiple observations to process this way---maybe just flip one over every now and then until we get as many as possible cleaned up.

So if you have some time between the winter fungi and waiting for the spring bloom, I'd be grateful for some assistance. If we get it all cleaned up, I promise to make a nice graph for you as a reward!

Gena