Too Much Bobcat

In LA, there is a saying - "You can never be too rich or too thin". You may however find yourself with too many bobcat videos. The following is about half the footage from this spot, but is still two minutes long:



This camera was in the Verdugo Mountains, a small ripple of earthquake fault just minutes from Burbank and Glendale; heavily used and enjoyed by city folk who only have an hour or two on the weekends to get out for some fresh air and exercise. Though rare, there has been the occasional mountain lion sighting here from time to time. Matt and I found a path that had been cleared by firefighters practicing their skills making firebreaks, which had many scrapes along it. Too small to be a cougar, but it was obviously some critter's daily commute. The cam was out barely two weeks, and captured 30 videos of these two bobcats. Look closely, and you will be able to tell them apart - one large adult, and a smaller juvenile (or female?). Their spot patterns are different, (the adult has muted spots, while the younger animal almost has rosettes) as are the stripes on the insides of their legs.

And anyone who has a pet cat will not be surprised at the scraping behavior (you can see it every day at the litterbox) but it shows that little has changed from your pet's wild ancestors. Watching this in action will also make it very easy to identify a scrape that you find on a trail - two strongly dug parallel lines, with a pile of dirt and leaves (and sometimes a little something extra...) at one end.

Thanks again to Matt who not only helped pick the spot, but waded through this wild litterbox to retrieve the cam while I was at work!