Thursday 10 March 2011

Mother, three cubs and the eel robber!


Enjoyed a wonderful encounter with a mother and her three cubs. When we found them (on a peninsula which I know well to be her favourite foraging ranges)they were well the way through the consumption of what looked to me to be a Conger eel. There was bits of chewed up fish matter smeared and scattered all over various areas of the exposed bed of bladder wrack seaweed, which was exposed by the ebb. Almost like piecing together a crime scene, I could well imagine and visualise each cub trying to take there turn at their share of the under water creature as they chased each other around and we could see that this was far from over!

The mother then arrived back onto the shore with a smaller catch which she released to the siblings and left them to squabble taking up another turn of her own on the eel. But a dog, a full grown adult (who I see regularly and am pretty sure is the father to the three), appeared on the scene. I had been watching him foraging some distance away and was not at all surprised to see him try to muscle in, but she was having none of it and saw him off. Not well enough though as his second attempt to rob her of her hard earned catch immediately fell into fight with one pulling against the other but this time his power won the day and off he scurried!