CANADA LYNX JINX BROKEN! Finally got to watch a Lynx in the daytime!

March 21 in the Superior National Forest of northern Minnesota. (Single frame plucked from video clip).

As I came over a rise, there it was…A Canada Lynx walking right towards me on a remote forest road. It was 9:30 am and sunny. It saw me and bounded off the road and into the 3-foot deep snow. I stayed put thinking that it might come my way via the pine woods. And after a few tense minutes of me second-guessing my intuition, it did!

Their giant oversized paws allow them to float over deep powder snow as they hunt their favorite prey…Snowshoe Hares.

My only other encounter was about 30 years ago while doing owl surveys at night with my friend Dave Benson. That one appeared in our headlights, just sitting in the road. They are very mellow cats, and are rarely in a hurry…Unless in hot pursuit of a hare!

2-minute video (photo is just a single frame from the video).

Watch the video to see it walking over the deep snow (click gear icon on bottom right to change resolution to higher quality).

Single frame plucked from video clip

Single frame plucked from video clip

Single frame plucked from video clip

March 16, 2019

A couple weeks ago Bridget and the boys got to watch this same Bobcat (likely the same one) go up to our rabbit pen and paw at the hardware cloth enclosure. A great experience from 6 feet away. PS The rabbits are just fine.

This morning the Bobcat was sitting just 20 feet away from our house for about 30 minutes at dawn. She’d sometimes glance towards our two pet rabbits who are kept outside but didn’t go over to the pen.  I got to watch her just “sitting pretty” for about a half hour. Bridget woke up and she got great looks too. The Bobcat even “meowed” a couple times. So cute!

She eventually sauntered away in the direction of our cabin. Since we have free-range chickens, I decided to distract our feline friend the next day with some wild food. I found two road-kill Snowshoe Hare and a deer rib cage which I put out in the woods. One Snowshoe Hare was gone the next morning.

Neat experience. Hopefully she will eat some of the Wild Turkeys that come to our feeders…It is a favored prey of Bobcats. Skogstjarna, Carlton County, Minnesota. (I don’t really know if this is a female…but this Bobcat was fairly small and has delicate features so I will call it a “she”)

Bobcat (Lynx Rufus) at our home in Carlton County, Minnesota (March 16, 2019)

All photos taken through our living room window (uncropped!)

[Canon 7D with Canon EF 400mm f5.6 L USM lens; 1/25 of a second at f5.6; ISO 3200 (!); +1 ev; braced on dining room divider wall and shot through living room window]

Video taken at dawn. So cute when she “meows” a couple times. No audio.

Purrrdy the house cat watching a BOBCAT through our Living Room Window