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欺生的水獭 Tourist Otters Confused by Accent Two Canadian otters at a sanctuary in Scotland
have been placed under 24-hour pr otection from aggressive local otters
who are confused by their "foreign accents," a newspaper reported.
The National Sea Life Sanctuary in Oban has installed an electric fence
and surveillance cameras to protect its Canadian guests, Fingal and
Sula, according to The Independent. Though almost twice the size of
their wild Scottish relatives, the pair are disadvantaged by their foreign
accents and scent . "Dialects are common in animal communications,
but because of the differences in the sounds they make it will be difficult
for these Canadian otters to communicate with the native ones,"
Matthew Evans, an animal communications expert from Stirling University,
was quoted as saying. "There is no doubt dropping two foreign otters
into a territory of wild locals would lead to the local ones beating
the living daylights out of the new ones*," he added. The pair
arrived at the center's Otter Creek on the banks of Loch Creran a year
ago and are currently being housed in an indoor seal pup nursery. 据报载，来到苏格兰一处保护区的两只加拿大水獭已经受到了24小时的严密保护，因为它们的“外国口音”引起了当地水獭的困惑和敌意。《独立报》报道，位于沃班的国立海洋生物保护区已经设置了电网和监视摄像机来保护这两位分别名为芬高和苏拉的加拿大客人。虽然这对水獭的体型几乎有其苏格兰野生亲戚的两倍大，但它们还是因为自己的“外国”口音和气味而处于下风。“动物交流中方言很常见，但是由于这两只加拿大水獭发出的声音和本地水獭不同，它们很难和本地水獭交流，”报纸援引斯特灵大学动物交流专家马修·伊万斯的话说。“毫无疑问，如果把两只外国水獭放到野生本地种的领地中，本地水獭会对新来者发起猛烈攻击，”他补充道。一年前，这对水獭来到了保护中心位于克雷兰湖畔的水獭溪中，目前它们被放养在室内的一个海豹幼崽保育所里。
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