Gary Shattuck was returning home from running errands on Saturday when he noticed a large cat walking along the roadside. Initially thinking it might be a bobcat or even a cheetah, he was surprised to discover it was a rare sighting of an endangered Canada lynx on a rural road in Shrewsbury, Vermont.
This sighting marks the first confirmed presence of Canada lynx in Vermont since 2018, according to wildlife biologist Brehan Furfey from the Vermont Fish and Wildlife Department.
Shattuck recounted that he was about 10 feet away from the lynx when he saw it around 6:30 p.m. “It looked malnourished but didn’t make any sounds. It didn’t even acknowledge or look at me,” he remarked.
Adult Canada lynx typically measure between two and a half to three feet in length and weigh between 15 to 30 pounds, as detailed by the Fish and Wildlife Service.
From the safety of his car, Shattuck spoke to the lynx, asking, “Hey, are you okay?” Although the animal’s ears perked up, it continued walking. “I’ll leave you alone, have a good night. So long,” he said before heading home.
At 73, Shattuck expressed his amazement, stating, “I’ve lived here almost 50 years. I’ve never seen anything like that.”
On August 17, he filmed a short video of the lynx and shared it with the Vermont Fish and Wildlife Department, expressing concern over the animal’s thin appearance. He noted that several of his neighbors also witnessed the wildcat.
“Canada lynx are endangered in Vermont and threatened nationally,” Furfey stressed. “That makes any verifiable lynx sighting in our state significant.”
Wild breeding populations of the lynx are primarily found in northern Maine, northern New Hampshire, northeastern Minnesota, northwestern Montana, northern Idaho, north-central Washington, and western Colorado, as reported by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. The Canada lynx, which resembles a bobcat, is distinguishable by its long black ear tufts, short black-tipped tail, large paws, and long hind legs, which aid in hunting snowshoe hares in snowy habitats.
Furfey speculated that the lynx Shattuck observed was likely a male searching for territory, a behavior known as “dispersing.” Due to their ability to travel long distances quickly, the lynx seen by Shattuck is probably no longer in Vermont.