Recent lynx sightings and an apparently growing bobcat population have raised hopes of a wild cat revival in New Hampshire.

Wildlife biologist Will Staats was driving along a rural street in northern New Hampshire last spring, near the Maine border, when he saw a good-sized mammal prance across the road ahead of him. Judging by its lanky hind legs and large paws, he knew right away he was looking at a Canada lynx, and as he watched it saunter through the trees and disappear into the woods, he cursed himself for not having a camera.

Seeing a lynx was a special treat for Staats, a biologist with the N.H. Fish and Game Department. Over the previous few years, he’d seen numerous tracks and heard several reported sightings, but he’d never actually witnessed a lynx in the state.

“It was tremendously exciting for me,” Staats said. “To finally just happen to see one was a huge thrill, that’s for sure.” 

Perhaps even more exciting was a pair of lynx sightings that occurred this fall in the North Country town of Pittsburg. A group of four lynx was seen and photographed on two separate occasions in November and December.

Lynx tracks have been confirmed in the North Country seven times since 2006. But the photographs this fall represent the first fully documented lynx in the state since a road-killed animal was found in 1993. Even more significant, the animals appeared to be kittens, which indicates the presence of a breeding family.

“The notable thing is that this tells us that we’ve actually had some reproduction in New Hampshire. We haven’t documented that before,” Staats said.

Canada lynx could be expanding into New Hampshire for the first time in nearly half a century. Fish and Game will conduct a survey for lynx this winter in an attempt to determine how many of the wild cats are roaming the state.

Meanwhile, Fish and Game is collaborating with the University of New Hampshire on a four-year study to examine the abundance of bobcats in the state. Increased sightings and captures over the last decade indicate their population is increasing.

Taken together, the presence of Canada lynx and eastern bobcats suggest a revival of wild cats in the Granite State. Exactly how much their populations have increased and why they are rebounding now remains unclear.

Canada lynx are about twice the size of an average house cat, measuring about three feet long and weighing between 15 and 30 pounds. They have tufted ears and silvery brown coats with black-tipped tails. They also have large, furry paws that serve as snowshoes when traversing areas of deep snow.

Lynx are state endangered and federally threatened, meaning it’s illegal to hunt or kill them. There are an estimated 600 to 1,200 lynx in Maine, mostly concentrated in the northern part of the state. But a decline in Maine’s population of snowshoe hare, the lynx’s favorite prey, may be causing the cats to wander farther south.

New Hampshire is at the southern tip of the Canada lynx’s natural range. Through the 1960s, the animals had a small but significant presence in the Granite State. But, in the intervening decades, they all but vanished from the region. 

Past reports of Canada lynx in northern New Hampshire were believed to represent temporary spillover from the larger population in Maine. But the recent kitten sightings in Pittsburg, along with an uptick in unconfirmed sightings in other towns, indicate a more permanent population could be settling across the border.

“We are picking up some anecdotal reports in some other towns in New Hampshire, we just haven’t confirmed that,” Staats said.

Pittsburg is New Hampshire’s northernmost town, bordering Quebec to the north, Vermont to the west and Maine to the east. It’s also the state’s largest town by area, and it has plenty of young, regenerating forest that provides ideal habitat for the lynx’s primary food source.

“It’s in an area that’s had some very active forest management that’s created conditions that are excellent for snowshoe hare,” Staats said. “It’s essentially setting the table for lynx.”

According to John Kanter, coordinator of Fish and Game’s Nongame and Endangered Wildlife Program, it’s possible that individual lynx could travel farther south, where snowshoe hare are sparse but red squirrels, a secondary food source, are abundant. But the bulk of the population will likely remain up north.

“As part of this population that’s connected to Maine, they’re going to be in the North Country where there are lots of snowshoe hares,” he said.

Fish and Game will be conducting formal surveys for lynx this winter, mainly searching for tracks along existing snowmobile trails in the North Country. Toward that purpose, the Nongame Program recently received about $4,000 in funding from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. But that will barely put a dent in the total cost of the survey, which requires monitoring across a broad range of forested lands.

“You have to cover a lot of ground in order to improve your chances of coming across them,” Kanter said.

The Nongame Program relies mainly on private donations, and Kanter is hoping the recent lynx sightings will spur people to donate more. For every donation, the program receives up to $50,000 in matching funds from the state.

Fish and Game conducts similar surveys for all federally endangered species that occur in the state, including roseate terns, dwarf wedge mussels and Karner blue butterflies. But the lynx is New Hampshire’s only endangered or threatened wild cat.

The eastern bobcat, by contrast, is not considered endangered or threatened, although its population experienced a sharp decline throughout New England in the late 1980s and early ’90s, according to Fish and Game biologist Patrick Tate. The cause of the decline is unclear, although biologists speculate it could have to do with weather variables such as heavy snow loads in the 1970s and ’80s.

But, since the late ’90s, New England’s bobcat population appears to be rebounding.

“Based on observation reports from the general public and based on bobcat vehicle collisions on our roadways, both have risen over the last eight or so years,” Tate said.

Again, the reason behind the apparent increase is uncertain. New Hampshire has not allowed bobcat hunting for the last 20 years. But Maine, Vermont and Massachusetts still have a bobcat hunting season. Since bobcat populations are on the rise in those states, too, hunting does not appear to be a factor in their recovery. 

“We’ve all experienced the same decline of bobcats and the same increase,” Tate said.

In fact, human development, in general, does not appear to be having a major impact on bobcats. If it was, their populations would not be increasing now.

The lack of an annual bobcat harvest in New Hampshire makes it difficult to estimate the total population. That’s why Fish and Game and UNH partnered to launch a cooperative bobcat project in 2009.

“The purpose of it is to document habitat use by bobcats, movement corridors within the landscape, and develop a bobcat population estimate,” Tate said.

A number of physical features help distinguish between an eastern bobcat and a Canada lynx. With its long hind legs and large paws, lynx can appear to be larger than bobcats, but they’re not. Eastern bobcats can weigh up to 50 pounds and have been known to take down full-grown deer in New Hampshire, Tate said. Bobcats are also more heavily spotted than lynx, like small leopards.

Bobcats are carnivores and will eat anything from small mice to adult deer. Young bobcats are subject to predation by fishers and coyotes, but when fully grown, they can fend for themselves. They’re found all over the state.

“Based on observation reports and road kills, the population is statewide, from border to border, tip to tip,” Tate said.

Working with UNH faculty and students, Fish and Game has collared a number of bobcats in southeastern New Hampshire with high-tech cell phone devices that send text messages every five hours detailing the animal’s GPS location. They’re currently monitoring five animals, including two in Rochester. There were two others, but one was struck and killed by a motor vehicle, and the other’s collar malfunctioned.

UNH is currently working on a computer model to develop an accurate population estimate. For now, though, they have no clear idea of how many bobcats there are. Tate is hopeful the population will continue to increase, but there’s no way to be sure.

“Projecting what animal populations will do in the future is very difficult, based on the weather conditions and prey densities and habitat,” he said.

Fish and Game officials are less hopeful about the presence of larger cats, like mountain lions. Over the last several years, unconfirmed sightings of mountain lions have increased in the state, but they have mostly proven to be cases of mistaken identity.

Kanter said the presence of mountain lions in New Hampshire is possible but highly unlikely. Investigations of mountain lion reports have yielded everything from bobcats to coyotes, but never an actual lion or its paw prints. Nor has anyone who reported a mountain lion been able to provide a photograph or video.

“We have not had that kind of evidence for mountain lions,” Kanter said. “This is the kind of evidence that we would need to have to be able to say, ‘Hey, yeah, we’ve got mountain lions.’”

But Kanter is confident New Hampshire has not seen the last of the Canada lynx. He pointed back to Staat’s sighting last spring.

“You know you’re headed in the right direction when you actually see one,” he said.