Otter unmasked as Chester hotel's £100k koi carp thief

A hotel has caught a "sneaky" otter "red-handed" after putting up CCTV to find the thief responsible for the loss of 50 koi carp worth about £100,000.

The Grosvenor Pulford Hotel, near Chester, set up cameras after the fish, each worth about £2,000, went missing.

The footage showed the unexpected interloper avoiding electric fences and snatching a carp before escaping.

Nelson Hotels & Inns director Andrew Nelson said the otter being revealed as the cunning culprit was a surprise.

A hotel representative said they noticed they were losing fish from two ponds in the hotel spa's Asian Sensory Garden, so set up the CCTV to see if they could unmask the thief.

The resulting video, which the hotel shared on Facebook, showed the otter avoiding an electric fence, which was put in place to prevent herons from catching fish, and stealing in to catch a carp.

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Mr Nelson said it was "definitely a surprise to find that an otter was the culprit for our huge loss of fish".

"With the fences we have installed previously to protect smaller fish from herons, we didn't expect any large animals to be able to access the pond areas," he said.

He added that the hotel was now "trying to find a solution to prevent any further loss".

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