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Lontra

Adapted from Wikipedia · Adventurer experience

A playful North American River Otter at the San Francisco Zoo.

Lontra

Lontra is a genus of otters from the Americas. Otters are playful and clever animals that love water. They often live near rivers, lakes, and coastal areas, where they swim, dive, and slide on their bellies over snow and mud.

The Lontra group includes several types of otters found in North and South America. These animals are important because they help keep the balance of nature by controlling fish and crab numbers.

Otters have thick, waterproof fur and webbed feet, which help them swim well. They are known for their cleverness and strong family bonds, making them interesting to watch in the wild.

Species

These species used to be grouped with the Eurasian otter in the genus Lutra, but they are now in their own genus called Lontra. There are five living species and one known species from the past that belong to this group.

Fossil Lontra remains from the Miocene of Florida (FLMNH). The oldest Lontra fossils known.
Scientific nameCommon nameDistribution
†Lontra weiriWeir's otterPliocene North America

Images

A river otter swimming through a hole in the ice on the Green River at Seedskadee National Wildlife Refuge.
A preserved Southern River Otter on display at the Museum of Patagonia in San Carlos de Bariloche, Argentina.
A playful river otter in its zoo habitat.
A marine otter at Huachipa Zoo in Lima, Peru.
Map showing the geographic range of the Lontra species.
Map showing where the Southern River Otter lives in South America.
Map showing where the Neotropical Otter can be found in the wild.
Map showing where the Marine Otter lives in the wild.

Related articles

Genus
Otter
Americas
Eurasian otter
Lutra

This article is a child-friendly adaptation of the Wikipedia article on Lontra, available under CC BY-SA 4.0.

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