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They float on the surface of the water, hold hands, are cute – and a real nuisance to the city-state of Singapore. The population of Otten there has doubled since 2019.

“They’re not afraid and the braver families just walk past us,” N Sivasothi, an associate professor of biological sciences at Singapore National University, told The Guardian. “There isn’t a place in all of Singapore where there aren’t otters.”

While in 2020 the National Park Administration NParks received 208 reports about Otten, in 2021 there were already 305. An August of this year there are already more than 300. Most of these reports are about sightings, but there are also isolated cases of attacks on humans. “We are faced with something unprecedented here,” says Sivashoti.

Otters generally only attack when provoked. However, due to the increasing broadening, incidents are occurring more and more often. For example, last year in the middle of the botanical garden, a Briton was chased and attacked by a group of otters.

The hand-held predators mainly feed on fish and amphibians, but also like to nibble on rats during the rice season. An (expensive) favorite dish of Singaporean otters: koi fish, which are kept in private ponds and are bought for several hundred thousand francs.

The Eurasian fish ott, which is native to Switzerland, spread very hesitantly in this country only after its reintroduction. Its Far Eastern counterpart, the Indian fish otter, has been on the rise in Singapore since the 1980s. At the time, the city-state invested in a modern sewerage system to combat water pollution. Since then, the Singapore River has been largely clean and a paradise for Otte and Öttin.

NParks has now successfully started a resettlement project. After nearly a week of bait, a family of otters that had dug under a sidewalk was moved to another location on the island. (cf.)