Here Kitty, Kitty

[Darryl Morris]

You just never know what you're going to find when you go fishing.



Caught it swimming across Bear Creek first thing this morning before we even set up on the first top. Two geese were following it until I jumped on the trolling motor and got up close and personal to get the pic. Once out of the water he was gone like a bullet.

[fishincrazy]

Great Pic!
By the way, what's the water temp?

[GRIZZ]

Cool! Bobcat? Ocelot? Aint fishing great?

Did you get a good look at its tail. Ocelots are very strong swimmers and have long tails unlike the bobcat. From the looks of the small muzzle and the ears I think it may have been one. They are endangered and very rare. Bobcats swim well too but the head doesn't look right. No ear tufts and bobcats have fairly large heads and muzzles.

Did you get any more pics of it? I'd love to see one of those in the wild.

I'm reading that its even possible that Jaguars could be that far north. They are much larger and more dangerous though.

The more pictures I look at the more I think it was a bobcat, which would have been the most likely. I see some with similar sized heads and fairly long tails. Half the length of an ocelot in some cases and just a bob in others. Pretty wide variety in spots as well and facial patterns.

[mrwillis]

I can honestly say that is a first for me to see!

[Darryl Morris]

Great Pic!
By the way, what's the water temp?

He was swimming in 48 degree water.

[DENNIS BOWERS]

Darryl,Super Picture!! We see them once in awhile here too.

[J White]

Man, you shoulda scooped him up in the net -
that would have been a hoot

[Cane Pole]

I have called them up with my squealing rabbit tape. We have a few around here. They pretty shy critters. They can bring down a small cow pretty easy. You can hear them squall at night sometimes during mating season. Awful sound.

[Darryl Morris]

Man, you shoulda scooped him up in the net -
that would have been a hoot

That thought never crossed my mind, but you can help the next time we see one, LOL. Actually, a friend of mine from high school had a bobcat as a pet. He raised it from a kitten. We still had to release it to the wild. That cat was one mean son of a gun.

[skiptomylu]

Great picture and moment for you. I love getting to see animals out where they are at home, but it's not very often you get to see a cat. I have had them run across the road or (deer hunting) before, but never seen one swimming.

We have a lot of them around here too as well as 2 big cats (mountain lions, or what even you want to call them). A couple of years back I got to see a Wolf run across the road.

How big was that Bobcat? He looks kind of big and I know they have a pretty wide range of size they can be. I think most are about 40#, but long time back know of one that got hit by a car some 60 miles East of here that was 70# or 80# (huge one) as I remember.