Bobcat

Onthesauk · August 23, 2009, 10:50:55 AM

Nearly lost a cat here a few minutes ago.

Sitting here reading the FF and the wife comes running in, says there's a bobcat stalking one of the cats. Right outside my window, our cat stalking a mouse and 15 feet away a bobcat stalking him. I step out the door and yell at our cat and the bobcat ran up the hill into the treeline.

Appeared to be a small one, maybe this this year's kitten just out on his own? Fired some birdshot into the hillside just for the noise, maybe encourage him to move on. We've seen them from the house before but never this close.

Jeff · August 23, 2009, 11:10:52 AM

I love it when Nature comes calling. :D

DanG · August 23, 2009, 11:32:18 AM

I had one run across the road in front of the car just a couple of days ago. That was the first one I have seen in several years. Fortunately, Linda had left her book at home, so she got to see it too.

LeeB · August 23, 2009, 05:06:46 PM

Around here the bobcats carry a disease called Bob cat fever. It doesn't effect the bobcat but is deadly to house cats with basicaly no hope for cure. Carried and spread by ticks. We have lost 6 cats to it in the last 2 years. Bobcats are not welcome here.

Magicman · August 30, 2009, 02:06:13 PM

This past deer season, I was sitting in a ladder stand and watched a bobcat stalk and catch a squirrel. A true Kodak moment and I didn't have a camera. Talk about quick. When he/she made it's move......it was all over. Breakfast.... ;D

SwampDonkey · August 30, 2009, 05:18:57 PM

We still have a bobcat trapping/hunting season here by lottery, drawn in October. It is zoned and not all zones allow harvesting of bobcat. All I have ever seen around here are tracks and very rarely. I have seen a few though up on the Tobique watershed in more remote areas. By a few I mean 2 or 3. Not up that way very often.

http://www.gnb.ca/0078/furharvest/Bobcat-e.asp

Can't hunt/trap lynx though in the Maritimes, but I think you can west of here.

okmulch · August 30, 2009, 06:07:59 PM

We have a bobcat that frequents our yard every now and then. We live just on the outskirts of Stillwater but have alot of wildlife. In July my wife was sitting at the dining room table watching some hummingbirds fight at the feeder, when her eye caught something coming out of the woods into the yard. It happened to be a mountain lion. She was to stunned enough to holler at me and it did not stay around long enough to get pics.
Our postal driver saw one about a year ago go through our yard up into the woods. the postal driver came back and told my wife about it because she knew we had small kids. Other neighbors have reported hearing and seeing the mountain lions more frequently also.
One would not think of them this close to a large town or in this area but I guess they are wandering closer and closer.

Onthesauk · September 10, 2009, 11:00:15 AM

Neighbor called about 9:30 last night, said there was a cougar on the hillside between his house and mine, heard it scream one time. With the noises he was hearing, could have been more then one. His black lab was cowered on the doorstep, wouldn't bark and wouldn't leave the porch. I let off a couple of rounds into the bank off the porch and believe he/they moved on.

Ironmower · September 27, 2009, 08:13:49 AM

My good friend I work with has a western bobcat for a pet (Bubby) he's 8 yrs old(the cat that is). My friend is the only person in fulton co PA. who has a permit to keep one and is checked out ever year by DNR.
First time I met bubby I'd say it was kinda of intimidating. He came out and jumped up and put his paws on my chest and licked me! My friend said, you're OK he likes ya, and no he is not declawed. Bubby has a huge fenced in area, with a plastic culvert connecting it to the basement. Whenn bubby is in, he has run of the whole house.

beenthere · September 27, 2009, 08:52:07 AM

And one day.....all heck will break loose. And then people will stand around and wonder what got into this gentle, friendly tabby. They are plain and simple, a wild creature.

tyb525 · September 27, 2009, 12:41:56 PM

With the huge barn cat population we have here, I wouldn't mind for a few cats to come up missing :

Onthesauk · September 30, 2009, 09:23:47 PM

Our resident bobcat was back about 10:30 last night, triggered the light outside our bedroom. Got up and raised the shade and he just stood there and looked at us, about 15 feet away. Stepped out on the porch and clapped my hands a couple of times and he just stood there and looked at me. Went in and grabbed a shotgun and fired some birdshot over his head and he just turned around and trotted up the hill. For what is suppose to be such a shy animal, this one sure is brave or indifferent.

Yonderosa · November 25, 2009, 10:16:32 AM

Last October I was eating breakfast when I noticed this dude stroll by.

[img width=500 --Photos MUST be in the Forestry Forum gallery!!!!!--/images/Pathfinder/obcat.jpg[/img]

He wasn't in any hurry so it gave me some time for the wife to hand me the camera. Managed to get a few pictures, this was the best. The flash on the inside of the window washed out the image some.

I see them once a year or so. This one was the biggest I've ever seen, easily the size of my Labrador. He's been real hard on the local turkey population and after talking to the local wildlife biologist may have even been responsible for a few of the deer kills I've found on my property.

beenthere · November 25, 2009, 12:52:14 PM

Yonderosa
That was a good speciment of a bobcat. Hope you post it in your gallery, and modify your post with the pic. 8)

Magicman · November 28, 2009, 10:17:51 PM

I watched one stalk and catch a squirrel last year. No camera, but even if I had, it all happened too quickly to have captured it. One second he/she was crouched.....the next it had breakfast.

WildDog · November 28, 2009, 10:27:34 PM

We don't get wild Bob cats down under but when I was 4yrs old the family went to Taronga Zoo in Sydney and a Tom Bob cat backed up to the fence and and apparently sprayed me with urine, dad wanted to put me in the car boot for the trip home, the smell must of been bad because my parents still bring it up from time to time.

Magicman · November 28, 2009, 10:48:45 PM

An old tom housecat will spray, especially if a female nearby is in heat. STINKS.

SwampDonkey · November 29, 2009, 05:05:56 AM

That's why I keep good doors on my buildings, to keep stray tom's out. One winter there were 4 or 5 strays around and they would try to get in my barn all the time because I had a fire in the shop end and they would get up over head and curl up next to the flu in insulation. They would hide under the lumber stacks when I went looking.

>:(

Chris Burchfield · November 29, 2009, 04:47:37 PM

Son tagged this bobcat after we'd both tagged a couple of eight points Black Friday.

Jeff · November 29, 2009, 05:24:40 PM

Nice size comparison shot.

Onthesauk · November 30, 2009, 11:31:35 AM

That picture really does give a good perspective on their size. I never think of them as big enough to bring down a deer but I know they do. Pictures helps explain how.

woodtick#2 · March 06, 2011, 08:04:39 PM

I live in the small state of Rhode Island and I am an active whitetail deer hunter. I was shocked to see a bobcat walk by my treestand one fall day while hunting.