People don't think of any specific kind of otter, you can only be sure that they are not thinking of giant otter or sea otter, but as of the rest for them they are the same cute river mammal, medium-small sized, with soft brown fur and white belly. Even inside this forum (where everyone is above average on animal knowledge) I bet most of us would fail a captcha test who asked us "choose the ASC otters" and the rest of the photos are other species of Eurasian and American river otters
Just like bears, they can distinguish brown and white bears, but if you talk them about "black bear" they don't stop to think which of the five species of black bears you are referring to.
By the way, ASCO in Spanish means "disgust", so every time someone says it when talking about the cute little otter I can't help laughing
That's why I try writing "ASC otter", but it's not that much better, and the full name is still too long
