Recently, one of our camera traps in southwest Primorye captured a Eurasian lynx (Lynx lynx). At first glance this might seem like nothing particularly unusual, because lots of different animals walk past our cameras, but this is noteworthy because this is the first time in the ten years of camera trapping in southwest Primorye that this species has been documented. And not just by us—our colleagues at the World Wildlife Fund (WWF), who have also been working with camera traps in other parts of southern Primorye, have confirmed that this is the first lynx photograph they’ve seen as well. And there it is, walking on a game trail usually walked by tigers and leopards, as though nothing were out of the ordinary.
Of course, no scientific conclusions can be based on only one photo, but the mere fact that this lynx appeared is very interesting, and raises many questions. Who is this cat? A resident that was somehow "lost" among leopard sign (lynx tracks can be confused with tracks of young leopards)? But then how did he manage to elude every single camera trap hidden in the forests of southern Primorye? These traps have captured all the other representatives of the local fauna, so why not lynx? Or maybe this is a transient—a young male, settling in to an unoccupied territory insulated from its primary habitat in the province.
We know that in northern Primorye, lynx are found in fairly large numbers, and in contrast to tigers and leopards, are not considered endangered. But the fact that southwest Primorye is cut off from the rest of the province by a wide transportation corridor through which large cats only rarely pass means that the felid populations of southwest Primorye are considered genetically distinct (see map). (см.карту)
Many people often ask us about the comparative sizes of wild felids. Although, of course, no one is larger than the tiger in our forests, here we show two superimposed pictures for comparison. Interestingly, both cats were photographed in almost exactly at the same place in both photos, and even their pose is the same. This should answer the question about relative size.
The emergence of this lynx is a good sign, and we hope that he will safely find his niche here and add to the felid diversity in the region.