Blue Ridge Parkway wildlife cam captures Bobcat with meal in mouth
A hungry bobcat was caught on a National Park Service infrared nighttime wildlife cam running with a rabbit clamped between its jaws. The National Park Service posted the video to its Facebook page with the caption, “When you grab the last cupcake from the breakroom…”
According to the Charlotte Observer, the park service uses the cameras to learn more about the wildlife that lives (and hunts!) along the Blue Ridge Parkway. The cameras have been funded by the Blue Ridge Parkway Foundation since 2009, and have captured more than 25,000 images of over 35 species of wildlife including black bears, bobcats, coyotes, red and gray foxes, elk, European wild hogs, white-tail deer and many other species, the foundation says.
To place the cameras, volunteers hike off the beaten paths into remote areas off the parkway and use GPS coordinates to place the motion-sensitive cameras, according to the Blue Ridge Parkway Foundation website. Volunteers then return periodically to find out what types of birds, mammals, reptiles and other creatures have been captured on camera. This kind of “citizen science” allows park biologists to cover more territory in a multiyear study of animal populations and their locations and habits.
As the video suggests, bobcats are excellent hunters. The cat, named for its bobbed tail, lives only in North America and grows to about double the size of a housecat.
