If You Take Away the Otter

Trueman paints the scene, concentrating on an otter family threatened by formidable harpoons from an abstractly rendered person in a small boat, with a sailing ship in the distance. "People do not always understand at first the changes they cause when they take too much." Sea urchins take over; a page turn reveals a barren landscape. Happily, the story ends well when hunting stops and the otters return...and with them, the kelp forests. A simple but effective look at a keystone species.

Buhrman-Deever explains how, starting in the 1700s, Russian explorers in Alaska nearly drove the otter to extinction through hunting for the international fur trade. Her vivid descriptions relate the devastating consequences on the ocean forest until a 1911 treaty protected the remaining otters. While larger text tells the story and smaller text adds important details, blue- and green-hued illustrations resembling watercolors highlight the habitat's richness.

Seaweed, snails, shrimp, fish, eagles, and the "kings of these forests"--sea otters--make up this ecosystem's food web. Facts about each species wind through the illustrations, which portray adorable (somewhat anthropomorphized) otters in a peaceful ocean environment. But, as Buhrman-Deever warns, this wasn't always the case...The disequilibrium is portrayed dramatically in Trueman's gauzy underwater illustrations.

Gr 2-4--The conditions needed to maintain the health of a kelp forest's ecosystem involve interdependent factors. Buhrman-Deever explains the science behind what happened to kelp forests when hunters brought the otter to near extinction in the early 1900s. Why were otters desirable? Their fur, which has "around one million hairs in a space the size of a quarter," is extremely warm. However, the international fur trade was not beneficial to everyone. As a result of the industry boom and an influx of explorers, Indigenous people experienced violence and disease. The otter population was drastically reduced. Otters helped keep an ecological balance by preventing their prey, the urchin, from overwhelming the kelp forests. The decreasing otter population allowed the abundance of urchins to decimate the kelp forest. In 1911, the United States, Russia, Japan, and Great Britain signed the International Fur Seal Treaty, which "stopped non-Indigenous sea otter hunting and selling of otter furs." In time, the otters returned. The luminous illustrations and clear text help young readers understand the causes and effects of the otter fur trade. The book's large type will appeal to younger readers. Facts printed in small type are suited for experienced readers. Back matter consists of a summary of the book's content, a selected bibliography, further reading, and websites. VERDICT A solid purchase for all public and elementary school libraries.--Nancy Call, formerly at Santa Cruz Public Libraries, Aptos, CA

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