When David Loop, president of cat rescue Sierra Pacific Furbabies, received a call last week from a hiker who’d stumbled upon what was thought to be a kitten, he didn’t anticipate anything extraordinary. However, upon opening the box containing the “kitten,” Loop was surprised to find that the animal inside wasn’t a cat at all — it was a bobcat.
Loop, accustomed to working with cats and kittens daily, immediately recognized the signs of a wild animal, not a domesticated house cat. “The ears, the tail, the markings — everything — resembled a baby bobcat,” Loop recounted.
Despite the understandable mistake made by the hiker in identifying the young bobcat as a kitten, Loop emphasized the distinct needs of each species. While rescued kittens thrive in loving homes, rescued bobcats require return to their natural habitat. Realizing he was dealing with a bobcat, Loop promptly contacted a wildlife rehabilitator.
“Wildlife is wildlife, and we have to defer to the experts,” Loop affirmed.
Leslie Triplett, a licensed wildlife rehabilitation specialist and head of Pond Digger Ranch Wildlife Rehabilitation, assumed responsibility from there.
Triplett explained that bobcat kittens typically do not venture from their dens alone at such a tender age unless something has gone awry. Given that the 5-week-old bobcat had been found wandering solo on the trail, shadowing the hiker, it’s probable that something had happened to his mother.
“He’s very small, so he’s lucky the hiker found him when he did,” Triplett remarked.
She stressed the importance of Loop’s prompt action in bringing the bobcat to a wildlife rehabilitator. Thanks to Loop’s quick thinking, the bobcat avoided becoming habituated to humans and will have the opportunity to be released back into the wild once he’s matured a bit more.
