“There’s a bobcat in our yard!” Rich exclaimed in a text. One July evening he’d been working on his computer when the cat sauntered in front of his window. It was the first bobcat we’d seen in our yard. Soon we started getting texts and calls from neighbors also spotting the impressive and beautiful predator.

Hoh Rainforest bobcat

We once watched a bobcat trying to catch a fish in Olympic National Park and, years ago, Rich had a fleetingly glimpse of one in New Jersey. Sightings are rare but increasing as bobcats expand their range.

Apex Predators

They are apex predators that love catching and snacking on squirrels, cottontails, mice, birds, and whatever else they can catch. They’re big. A male can weigh upwards of 40 pounds while a female can reach 34 pounds. They can run at 30 miles an hour and jump ten feet. It all helps them catch dinner. They are no danger to people.

We live between Cedar Rapids and Marion. Aside from a 110 acre natural area north of our yard, houses and roads fill the area. How can a large predator live here?

Habitat

Bobcat in woods. Photo credit, Mark Yilmaz

According to many wildlife biologists bobcats do well in suburbia. They den in rock outcroppings, under big dead trees and other places where they enjoy some privacy.  Many city and county parks have those places where a cat can raise its kittens and forage in nearby suburbs while rarely being seen.

“We know bobcats are doing well near Des Moines. Bobcats and coyotes don’t really like each other but they seem to coexist. Coyotes eat berries and other fruit,” (as well as small mammals) said Vince Evelsizer, the Iowa DNR furbearer biologist.

Food Sources and Habits

Think about a suburban neighborhood. Cottontail rabbits scamper about  most lawns, mice are everywhere, and even stray house cats wander about. All could make a nearby bobcat a meal.

Bobcats mostly hunt when the light’s low in the early morning and late afternoon and often find good hunting near houses and roads. Our neighbors are seeing them in broad daylight.

Expanding Range

They were once nearly extirpated from Iowa but a few hung on in the rough pastureland of the state’s southernmost counties. They began spreading north in the 1970s and 1980s and we first started hearing about them in the Cedar Rapids area in the early 1990s. Now they seem well established in our metro area.

Are there bobcats in other towns and cities? You bet. They are an amazingly adaptable animal that range from Florida’s everglades up to chilly Rocky Mountain Peaks. They’re at home in Arizona’s deserts and Minnesota’s farm country. No doubt they live in and near even large cities across much of the continent.

How to Tell a Bobcat From a House Cat

Bobcats resemble house cats but  have a few bobcat in woods.

• Bobcats are much bigger than house cats, but it’s sometimes tough to tell how big an animal is during dim light and at a distance. There’s a trick to learn the size. Watch the cat as it passes a fencepost, tree, or building and note where the animal’s back is in relation to a tree branch, knothole, or strip of siding. Later take a  ruler there and measure how tall the animal is. A bobcat will stand 18-24 inches at the shoulder while a house cat measures  nine to 10 inches tall.
• Bobcats are really “bob tailed cats”. Look for a short stumpy tail.
• A bobcat’s legs are longer in proportion to its torso than a house cat’s. They can walk quickly.
  

  

  Note the long stride of the Bobcat.

  

  Stalking Photo by Ben Kock

  
  

Photo Op

Worried about being attacked by a wildcat? Not to worry. They keep their distance from people. Instead, be happy if one is spotted, and try to snap a photo.