Page 28 - May/June 2019 W.C.T. Magazine

26nWCT
The caller insisted that the bobcat showed up every day, usually at 3 P.M. and
she was worried about her little dogs. I was skeptical. Most bobcat sightings are actually house cats and a regular, daily
bobcat sighting is almost unheard of. But she was willing to pay
for the site visit
and there were bobcat tracks in the flowerbed, so I left a cage trap hastily set with a piece
of chicken (actually a
piece of my lunch). Imagine
my surprise when she called back at 3:10 PM with the news that
I had caught the bobcat!
That’s not how
it usually goes. Urban
and suburban bobcats are notoriously difficult to pin down. Yet people get very excited when they see one, and frankly they get excited when someone else sees one. I’ve seen phones light up over the rumor of a bobcat in a neighborhood.
Bobcats are usually solitary, but a female will raise one litter of 1-4 kittens each year. Bobcats breed in January and some of the calls that time of year are based on sightings of solitary males which travel to find mates. The male does not stay with the female after breeding so any sightings of multiple cats is either a courting pair or a female with kittens (any young of the year would be kittens - even if they are the
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t h o u g h
scavenge when it’s placed right in front of them.
While bobcats are territorial, the size and shape of the territory in developed areas can be difficult to discern. Bobcats are most adapted to hunting rabbits, though they will eat squirrels, birds or even house cats. Like most cats, bobcats hunt with their eyes, cruising the edges of open areas during the night while looking for prey. During the day, they tend to lay up in thick brush where they can detect predators (urban coyotes and dogs) and escape by climbing a tree. In a
developed landscape, bobcats tend to stay in open green space around waterways, rough canyons or draws (which were too rugged to be developed) or other large
places like golf courses and airports. In my experience, bobcats don’t enter neighborhoods with houses on quarter- acre lots, but instead are found in higher end developments with larger lots and more open space between houses. From a business standpoint, these are the customers who are more likely to pay for a service, but they also require a little more
attention.
It’s probably
important to note that bobcats have seasonal movement patterns that can help, or frustrate you when you’re trying to solve a problem. As mentioned, male bobcats move a considerable distance when looking for mates and in January or February, bobcats may be miles away even a day after being spotted. In the late spring and summer, female bobcats are tied to very small home ranges as they raise kittens. As the kittens grow and later when they disperse, movements can expand again. In all cases, they will spend time where they can successfully hunt, so in summer rodent and rabbit populations are high and cats can move more freely. As winter comes on, prey numbers decrease
nuiSance BoBcatS
by Hunter Bodenchuk
same size as the female). Bobcats are obligate predators - they hunt and kill their prey,
they will