The Canadian sub-arctic: a harsh environment with short winter days seeing temperatures
plunge below negative sixty degrees celsius.
Deep snow covers much of the landscape, making survival here almost impossible.
Yet, there’s one predator that’s evolved a set of tools that allow it to thrive in
these extreme conditions.
While few have ever seen one, this region’s apex predator rules with a huge, fluffy, padded
fist.
This is the winter ghost, the Canada Lynx.
Hi, I'm Daniel Dufault, you're watching Animalogic, and this is a Canada Lynx.
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The Canada Lynx is the most northern dwelling wild-cat in the world.
Found mostly in Canada and Alaska, its range is massive and more northerly than any other
feline, with its cousin,
the Eurasian Lynx being a very close second.
The Canada Lynx’s range is limited by the tree line - relying on the cover of foliage
to hide their approach from their prey.
As climate change is warming the globe, the northern edge of their range will expand as
it becomes warm enough for trees to grow -
making the Canada Lynx one of the few species that benefits from climate change - at least
in this one very specific instance.
To get a closer look at them we traveled to the boreal forests of The Yukon during an
early winter cold snap.
Temperatures were balmy…
peaking at about -45 degrees celcius, but the frozen noses and toes were worth it to
see one of the most iconic, yet illusive cats in the world.
We finally made it all the way to the Yukon.
This is the furthest north I have ever been.
We're here to look for some of North America's most incredible cold climate creatures.
The Canada Lynx’s range overlaps with the cougar around the slopes of the mountains
of the pacific northwest, but luckily they avoid conflict by going for different prey.
Usually.
Cougars can weigh up to 100 Kilograms and routinely hunt sheep, goats, and deer, which
can be even larger than they are.
Canada Lynx are much smaller - about the size of an English Cocker Spaniel, with a maximum
weight of 15 kilograms.
The Canada Lynx is the second largest member of their genus,
after the Eurasian lynx,
but they’re much larger than their other two cousins, the endangered Iberian Lynx and
the bobcat, which is technically a lynx.
Look at their fluffy tails
This might seem surprising because at first sight they look like large house cats, but
they’re basically just a thick coat of fur wrapped around four stilts.
Their fur is about 10cm long in the winter.
So if you were to poke one, your finger would disappear in their fur.
And then you’d lose it.
You shouldn’t poke a lynx.
Hashtag science.
These frosty felines have extra long hind limbs, but they're not designed for a long
distance chase.
What they are good for is bounding out of the snow and pouncing on their prey.
Living in environments full of ice and snow for most of the year makes chasing impractical,
so Canada lynx,
much like foxes,
polar bears, and other northern carnivores,
are ambush predators.
But before going out on the hunt, you need a big stretch to limber out.
Streeeeeetch.
Oh that’s good.
They use their amazing sense of smell and hearing to find their prey’s dens.
They wait patiently for them to come out and then…
they strike.
This lynx is on the prowl.
Just beyond the treeline it’s spotted it’s next meal.
A mallard.
It waits patiently for the mallard to get within striking distance.
It’s gray coat camouflages the lynx perfectly against a tree.
And then…
it pounces.
It quickly snaps the mallard's neck, punctures its throat and carries it off into the woods
to devour.
The Lynx calls the boreal forest its home and never really travels beyond the tree line
into the tundra because it is so closely reliant on its food sources in the forest.
Canada lynx are one of the most specialized predators on Earth.
One single prey species can make up to 97% of their diet in parts of their range.
For Canada Lynx living in those areas, their lives depend on the deaths of snowshoe
hares.
This reliance on snowshoe hares is particularly important in the northern part of their range,
where there isn’t much else to eat.
An average lynx catches 3 hares a week and when there are too many lynx, this causes
a hare population collapse.
Every 8 to 11 years snowshoe hare populations dip below a critical point and the local lynx
are unable to get enough food to survive.
Snowshoe hare density can fall from over twenty three hundred hares per square kilometer to
about 12 hares per square kilometer in under 2 years.
That’s a 99.99% decline in the span it took to reboot Spiderman.
The lynx are then forced to leave the area, sometimes traveling up to 1000 km in search
of food.
They will have no babies for up to 2 years.
Many lynx starve during this period.
Some die of natural causes exacerbated by the lack of food, and others are forced to
go for more dangerous prey and end up dying.
This causes a collapse in lynx populations, which eventually leads to a recovery of snowshoe
hare populations.
Then the lynx return, they start having babies, and the cycle starts anew.
All of this has happened before.
All of this will happen again.
These cats only live where snowshoe hares are abundant, and because they face the same
environmental challenges, they have convergently evolved to be very similar.
The old saying you are what you eat seems to really apply for the Canada lynx because
it shares a lot of adaptations in common with its main prey.
The snowshoe hare.
One of the biggest issues for small animals in these regions is how to get around when
there are several feet of snow on the ground for over half of the year.
Getting stuck in a snowbank can easily be fatal.
The Linx paws are truly massive.
This helps them distribute their weight across the snow and acts very much like a snowshoe.
Yet another thing it has in common with a snowshoe hare.
They’re up to 10 cm across, which is cartoonishly huge for an animal their size.
It would be like a beagle having paws the size of paperbacks.
They have short tails and ears to reduce heat loss, and they have two layers of densely
packed fur to keep them warm at temperatures as cold as -60 degrees celsius.
Here in The Yukon, we got lucky to see a brand new mom.
It is extremely beautiful here, but it's just as cold as it is pretty, everything is just
frosted and dusted with snow.
Apparently, there's giant mountains here.
I just can't see them yet through all the snow.
We arrived here in the Yukon pretty late last night just
past midnight, and there's only about four hours of sunlight per day here.
We need to work fast, try and find some animals, get some good footage.
We're about to go see some Canada Lynx, and I am so beyond excited, these animals are
one of my favorites on the planet.
Oh, my God, here they come.
There's momma and her kitten.
The mating season is spring, and babies are born in the early summer, so this kitten is
about 5 months old.
She’ll stay with his mom until next spring, but won’t become sexually mature until the
following year.
At this age she can go out with mom on her hunts.
Oh, that's a feisty little kitten.
She's trying to snag the meat away from from her
own mom.
Snowshoe hares are still the main priority but they won’t reject carrion or other easy
to catch prey like grouse.
Canada Lynx are more active at night, but their great senses of smell and hearing can
alert them to roadkill or other available prey.
In this case, it’s the remains of a bird.
At night, when they’re out on the hunt, they’re more likely to run into other lynxes
in their range who are doing the same thing.
These conflicts can get… awkward.
We get it.
You don't like each other.
The canada Lynx has disappeared from the most southerly limits of its range,
but is still relatively abundant in most of Canada and Alaska.
It’s considered a threatened species in the contiguous 48 states ,
but it has been successfully reintroduced to rocky mountains in Colorado and there their
populations are growing.
If you live somewhere near snowshoe hares, keep an eye out for one of the world’s most
unique, beautiful, and mysterious cats - you could be in the presence of a Canada lynx.
Being this close to a mama lynx her and her cub was incredible heart-warming, and we couldn’t
get enough - so we left the Yukon, and drove 400 kilometers to Alaska to meet up with Steve
Kroschel, who happens to be friends with a big male lynx.
So for the second time this week…
…. I'm hanging out with a Canada lynx
Our first stop here at the Kroschel Nature Center is to see a lynx.
They've got a male one here and his name is Linux.
This is the land of misfit animals Walk with me danielle!
Come right with me now!
We are friends after all
Oh, my goodness.
I'm going to enter the Lynx enclosure.
Wish me luck.
I will protect you from a dangerous animal.
Now, I've never let anybody come in here before.
Oh, really?
Oh okay, first.
And you just surprised me.
Thank you.
Thank you for closing the door.
Now it's a wild and dangerous animal territory.
So go ahead and shoo it.
Oh, I am.
You should be safe.
And it's such an honor to be sharing space with the Lynx, which is a dream.
Yeah, they're there.
I worked with Lynx my whole life.
Yeah.
The ethology you see now what I'm going to do here because he's curious.
Walk over here.
Look over here now.
Look on the bright side.
I'll protect you.
I'm going to the space and what we're going to do is just talk to him here.
Now I have a various calls and I'd like you to make these calls.
Oh, I'd love to.
The call is as follows
perfect.
Ok, now toss this tidbit, this part, OK, your mittens going to be dirty, but OK, fine, I
can wash them.
Make that call again.
Ok, here somewhere.
Now throw it.
Throw it.
Good job, Danielle.
Thank you.
You're building a relationship coming over here.
He's really Been marking this carcass.
Right?
Yeah.
You know, now what you want to do is just purr.
They do purr, you know, like this.
Oh, that's a very different perk.
Yeah.
Well, you're building a relationship with the lynx, do you like that?
It's one of my dreams come true, essentially.
So he did not become aggressive, so kind.
See, you give off a frequency that the animal can understand.
That's the thing.
Various people give off various frequencies and animals can read it.
They read honesty, sincerity and all of these good things.
All these virtues and the animal can tell
That I believe in that very much.
All the animals have ever had in my life have been great judges
of character from the get go.
Thats the lie detector of the wild!
Of course the “don't pet a lynx” rule doesn’t apply if you’re steve!
Thanks for having us!
So what should we talk about next?
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Thanks
for watching!