I've seen river otters in Elliott Bay (the bay by the city of Seattle),
off of Myrtle
Edwards park, as well as Jetty Island (by Everett).

More to the point, I wouldn't be surprised if the birds that took flight
weren't so
sure this wasn't a *mink*. I've found tracks of a large mustelid (fancy
talk, which
I probably have wrong, for the weasel family, which to-date does not
include
one Slade Gorton ;-) side-by-side with tracks of a domestic cat that
was
moving in a *hurry* on the north beach at Discovery Park.

While researching the tracks I found (two winters ago), I learned that
mink are
known throughout the Puget Sound waterfront, and that they will eat just
about
any warm-blooded animal (and fish, of course) they can overpower.

Michael Patrick
(206) 743-8204
mpatrick at eldec.com