An employee at the Monterey Bay Aquarium in Monterey, California, posted a photo of a bedraggled, apparently overweight sea otter this week, poking a little fun at the animal’s size and calling the otter, named Abby, “a thicc girl.”
Many Twitter comments on the “chonk” otter followed, but the tweet implying that Abby is overweight is actually wrong, according to the aquarium.
The aquarium's curator of mammals, Christine DeAngelo, told the Los Angeles Times that the photo was taken at a bad angle and that the 11-year-old otter is really a healthy 46 pounds.
“That’s not blubber or anything,” DeAngelo said. “It’s just the angle of her hips and the way she’s rolled. She’s one of our most photogenic animals.”
Abby is one of five sea otters at the facility, which helps rehabilitate orphaned pups, the Times reported. She is herself a rescue animal that was not able to be released back into the wild, but the pups she helps raise are.
DeAngelo told the newspaper she was surprised by the photo because the otter is "actually very pretty and usually perfectly groomed."
“We said, ‘Oh, my gosh, look at her!’ She’s not a big animal.”
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