{"id":19946,"date":"2017-04-08T08:29:31","date_gmt":"2017-04-08T15:29:31","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.kootenay-lake.ca\/?p=19946"},"modified":"2017-04-08T08:29:31","modified_gmt":"2017-04-08T15:29:31","slug":"otter-in-suspension","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.kootenay-lake.ca\/?p=19946","title":{"rendered":"Otter in suspension"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>A travelling\u00a0animal can employ\u00a0various gaits, a word that describes the\u00a0pattern of movement of limbs during locomotion. A\u00a0bipedal human might walk, hop, or run, each a different form of propulsion. The transition from one gait to another takes place\u00a0when the energy it takes for, say, a fast walk begins to exceed that of a slow run. Quadrupeds, such as a horse, deer, or dog often have a wider range of choices which might include: walk, amble, pace, trot, canter, gallop, run, or stot.\u00a0<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_19974\" style=\"width: 370px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-19974\" class=\"wp-image-19974\" src=\"https:\/\/blog.kootenay-lake.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/04\/muledeertrotting110412s.jpg\" alt=\"\" onclick=\"return false\" onmousedown=\"return false\" width=\"360\" height=\"240\" \/><p id=\"caption-attachment-19974\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">A trotting mule deer is in suspension (2011).<\/p><\/div>\n<p>A characteristic of some of the faster gaits is a period\u00a0of suspension: a time when all four feet are off the ground. It seems that the\u00a0faster the animal\u00a0moves, the longer the period of suspension: Aerial time matters for speed.<\/p>\n<p>Many rapidly moving quadrupeds exhibit a period of suspension.<\/p>\n<p>Do otters?<\/p>\n<p>A <a href=\"http:\/\/www.sciencedirect.com\/science\/article\/pii\/S1095643302001368\" target=\"_new&quot;\">2002 paper<\/a>\u00a0that studied the running energetics of the River Otter noted that:<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>&#8230; the ability to incorporate a period of suspension during high speed running was an important compensatory mechanism for short limbs&#8230;. Such an aerial period was not observed in river otters&#8230;.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<div id=\"attachment_19948\" style=\"width: 370px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-19948\" class=\"wp-image-19948\" src=\"https:\/\/blog.kootenay-lake.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/04\/otter150901s.jpg\" alt=\"\" onclick=\"return false\" onmousedown=\"return false\" width=\"360\" height=\"240\" \/><p id=\"caption-attachment-19948\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">An otter family walking; None are in suspension (2015).<\/p><\/div>\n<p>It is interesting that the authors of this study did not see a running otter in suspension. I do not know how\u00a0the paper&#8217;s authors motivated\u00a0the otters to run, yet that motivation clearly wasn&#8217;t sufficient to prompt them to excel.<\/p>\n<p>I recently watched\u00a0two otters in suspension while they were running and the motivation seemed to be purely that of having fun &#8212; otters, after all, will be otters.<\/p>\n<p>This running otter is in suspension. It was racing along a dock before making a great leap\u00a0into the water &#8212; rather like a child racing up a diving board before leaping off the end. The first otter was followed by a second that did likewise. It seems that pleasing a researcher isn&#8217;t as important to a River Otter as having fun. <br \/>\n <img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft size-full wp-image-19947\" src=\"https:\/\/blog.kootenay-lake.ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/04\/otter170330bs.jpg\" alt=\"\" onclick=\"return false\" onmousedown=\"return false\" width=\"720\" height=\"480\" \/><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>&nbsp; A travelling\u00a0animal can employ\u00a0various gaits, a word that describes the\u00a0pattern of movement of limbs during locomotion. A\u00a0bipedal human might walk, hop, or run, each a different form of propulsion. The transition from one gait to another takes place\u00a0when the &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/blog.kootenay-lake.ca\/?p=19946\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-19946","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-mammals"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.kootenay-lake.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19946","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.kootenay-lake.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.kootenay-lake.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.kootenay-lake.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.kootenay-lake.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=19946"}],"version-history":[{"count":40,"href":"https:\/\/blog.kootenay-lake.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19946\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19989,"href":"https:\/\/blog.kootenay-lake.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19946\/revisions\/19989"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.kootenay-lake.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=19946"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.kootenay-lake.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=19946"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.kootenay-lake.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=19946"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}