Like the Seal, the Sea Otter is gregarious, being often found “in bands numbering from fifty up to hundreds. When in rapid movement, they make alternate undulating leaps out of the water, plunging again as do Seals and Porpoises. When in a state of quietude, they are much of the time on their backs. They are frequently seen in this posture, with the hind flippers extended, as if catching the breeze to sail or drift before it. They live on Clams, as well as Crabs and other species of Crustacea; sometimes small fish. When the Otter descends and brings up any article of food, it instantly resumes its habitual attitude on the back to devour it. On sunny days, when looking, it sometimes shades its eyes with one fore paw, much in the same manner as a person does with the hand.”[194] This curious habit, as we have seen, is adopted also by the Glutton. The supine position is so habitual that the females actually sleep in the water on their backs, with the young ones clasped between their fore paws. While in this position, too, the Otter will toss a piece of sea-weed backwards and forwards from paw to paw, like a ball, and the mother play with her offspring for hours together. The fur is very valuable, and the animal is consequently hunted regularly; so regularly, that there is every possibility of the species becoming speedily extinct unless some check is put upon the chase. For taking some action in the matter, there is the further reason that the natives of the Aleutian Isles, the chief resort of the animal, are dependent on its hunting for their subsistence, and it has been shown that the people have diminished in numbers coincidently with the Otters. “There are four principal methods of capturing the Sea Otter, namely, by _surf-shooting_, by _spearing-surrounds_, by _clubbing_, and by _nets_.” [Illustration: FEMALE SEA OTTER SWIMMING ON HER BACK WITH YOUNG IN HER ARMS. (_After Steller._)] “The surf-shooting is the common method, but has only been in vogue among the natives a short time. The young men have nearly all been supplied with rifles, with which they patrol the shores of the island and inlets, and whenever a Sea Otter’s head is seen in the surf, a thousand yards out even, they fire, the great distance and the noise of the surf preventing the Sea Otter from taking alarm until it is hit; and in nine times out of ten, when it is hit in the head, which is all that is exposed, the shot is fatal, and the hunter waits until the surf brings his quarry in, if it is too rough for him to venture out in his ‘bidarkie.’ This shooting is kept up now the whole year round.