Reflections on a Bobcat Sighting on Palm Coast’s Squadron Place

tháng 6 16, 2021

So, I’m on my screened again porch this morning on the southeastern fringe of Seminole Woods, speaking by telephone to my girlfriend, after which out of the nook of my eye I see this man. I named him Bob, which is “Bob” spelled backwards.

That is the primary bobcat I’ve seen throughout my 31 years in Florida. At my hermitage beside the wilderness in Palm Coast, there are wild woods to the south and flatwoods to the east and southeast. Bob sat on the east fringe of my yard for a full 20 minutes.

It’s troublesome to gauge his dimension by these pictures. Within the close-ups he seems bigger than to the bare eye, whereas the distant shot makes him seem a lot smaller than he truly is. He’s in regards to the dimension of a medium-to-large canine — a bit smaller than a German shepherd.
Each every now and then he appeared to note the press of my digital camera as I took pix from the open window of my eating nook. A number of different occasions he alerted on some sound or motion. However principally he simply chilled — for 20 minutes! Then he turned and walked eastward into the patch of forest that offers solution to the extra open, prairie-like panorama of the flatwoods.

As Elena Jarvis and my Audubon information to Florida wildlife be aware, bobcats are nocturnal, so it’s uncommon to see one out within the open throughout the day.
I’m going to place out a saucer of milk and a few Meow Combine or tuna, and if Bob comes again I’ll scratch him behind the ears. (Kidding . . .)

After posting this account on Fb some responses stated that Bob seems like a lynx. I believed so too, however my Florida Audubon guide has an entry just for a bobcat — however its scientific title is “Lynx rufus.” Others stated this seems like a feminine. I believed that too — it seems to my human thoughts to have what I’d name a “female” magnificence. However then I noticed which may be me anthropomorphizing its look, and my Audubon guide notes no differing bodily traits between female and male bobcats. Nonetheless, sure it could be a feminine — I don’t actually know.

And to my buddy Becky Magnolia who posed the query, “What was its message?”

Ah Becky, you realize my Pagan coronary heart! I’ve been pondering that, and I overlooked of my authentic publish that it has been a really lively day for the crows at my hermitage beside the woods. They’ve been cawing like loopy since simply after dawn, and I’m seeing and listening to greater than the standard three who go to my yard. They could be alerting on the red-shouldered hawk I heard earlier, or Bob himself — the Audubon information says bobcats “stalk and ambush small mammals and birds at evening.”

I’m undecided what’s happening, but it surely’s one thing. But Bob was simply chillin’ like a Zen grasp. And, as Becky spurred me to ponder: That is possible the longest encounter I’ve ever had with a wild animal. Hmmmm. In order that’s his message to me: Simply chill, and life will unfold. Bob jogged my memory of a quote from poet Rainer Maria Rilke that got here up on my each day Zen calendar final week: “Let life occur to you. Consider me, life is in the fitting, at all times.”