There are many kinds of animal you can find on earth but until today, the scientist cannot confirm how many kinds of the animal exact number. They believe that among 8.7 species in this world, around one to two billion of it are animals. That shows that around 12% of this world consists of animals. Their existence surely is important. If you remember when studying Biology in elementary school, the teacher taught about food chains. Grass, as a producer, is eaten by a grasshopper. Grasshopper is eaten by a bluebird. Bluebird is eaten by a snake. Snake is eaten by an owl. In this food chain, the owl is not eaten by any animals. When it dies, its body will be broken down by decomposer into nutrients. These nutrients are “the food” for the grass at the beginning of the food chain. From this example, we can see that animals have an important role in and for the environment.

With that fact, we can make a conclusion that it is our, the human beings, job to keep the animals save or at least do not do anything that will harm the animals’ existence. But unfortunately, many people are still not aware of this responsibility. Those people are willing to kill animals to get money in return. For example, the ivory of the elephant is something that has been sold in many countries. To get this ivory, the people will hurt the elephant. Fortunately the terrible incident of selling ivory has been banned in many countries but still, because of the elephant hunting that has been going on for many years, the condition of elephants are still vulnerable.

The elephant is not the only endangered animal on earth. There are still many other animals such as rhino, polar bear, and the Siberian tiger. Another example is Lynx, a carnivore cat found in Russia.

Lynx, The Gorgeous Endangered Cat

These are some of the things we can learn about Lynx:

• Habitat

Lynx is found in Russia, specifically deep in the coniferous forest located in the western borders to Kamchatka and Sakhalin.  You can also find them in a small number in the Carpathians, the Caucasus, and Central Asia.

• Appearance

This beautiful wild cat has the body length of 76-106 cm for male while the female is 3-6 inch shorter. This is not included the length of the tails. Usually the length of the tail, both male and female, is around 10-20 cm. With this common body length, they usually weight as much as 16-20 kilograms. In a very rare case, you can find a Lynx with a weight up to 30 kilograms.

From its appearance, it can be concluded that Lynx is a medium-sized animal. It has a round head with small ears. Its torso is relatively short and its legs are thick, slender, and highly elevated, with large rounded paws and sharp claws. This animal can also adapt very well with the weather. In wintertime, it has soft, long, and thick fur almost all over its body.

The thickness and the dark spots of the Lynx body is a little bit different. Its body is covered with thick fur except for its belly. Even its paws are furred. The large dark spots can be found on the back and the sides while the small one on the arms and legs. You can see a different appearance during the summer time. On summer, Lynx’s fur is rougher and shorter. The color of its fur is also brighter.

• Behavior

Lynx is a great animal not only proved by its ability to adapt to the weather but also by its agility. This animal is basically a sedentary animal but when the winter comes and it needs to find food, it will walk through very cold weather with deep snow everywhere to feed itself. It will go through a very long journey as fast as 30 km in 24 hours to find its meal. Lynx is not only a fast runner but also a high jumper. Its jumping can reach as high as 3.5-4 meters. It is also great at swimming. Fascinating right?

In term of its food, the Lynx eats anything that moves. It can eat hare, deer, bird, rodent, boar, and elk. But its basic diet usually consists of a hare or medium-sized ungulate. Lynx hunts its victim in a unique way. As mentioned before, because Lynx is a sedentary animal, it will lie and wait for its victim to come. Unfortunately, because of this method, Lynx can be easily hunted by other predators, such as dogs and wolves. Lynx does this only in the winter time. In the summertime, it will wait for its victim by climbing the tree and waiting for its “meal” from the height. The fact that Lynx is being hunted by wolves is another good example of a food chain. In the areas where there are many wolves, the number of Lynx is very small.

• Threat

According to the information about its habitat, Lynx can be found in many places. This might show that the population of Lynx is spread widely. But still, it does not deny the fact that the number of this species is decreasing. Just like people who hunted elephants to get its valuable ivories and sell them, there are also many people that go after Lynx and are willing to harm it so they can get the thick fur. After that, they will sell the fur so they can get paid for this very valuable thing.

The decreasing number of Lynx is also caused by its habitat destruction. Just like many animals, once they lose their home, it will be hard for them to survive. Lynx is also considered to be a pest to livestock. Because of this, it is treated like a pest, which is destroying Lynx completely. These ill treatments towards Lynx species and its habitat only give the worst effect to this beautiful wild cat.

Now that many countries have taken the case of elephant poaching and banned the selling of ivories, the same thing must be applied for Lynx. Countries must also state that they do not allow the selling of Lynx fur at all. It is also important to make sure that its habitat remains on its best condition so the Lynx can live in its natural habitat.

Those are the things about the gorgeous but unfortunately endangered Lynx. Let’s hope its population can live safely 🙂