What Type Animals Are Common In Temple Tx

Texas Junior Naturalists

Texas is home to 7 different cat species including several endangered ones.

Bobcat

The bobcat is a medium-sized, ruby-red brown cat about the size of a chow domestic dog. Length of the adult is well-nigh three feet, half-dozen inches. Weight is 12-20 pounds, occasionally upwards to 36 pounds in old, fat males. Bobcats are highly adaptable felines and throughout near of their range in Texas take shown a marked ability to cope with the inroads of human settlement.

The bobcat's food consists mainly of small mammals and birds. Amidst the mammals found in bobcat stomachs, forest rats, basis squirrels, mice and rabbits supply the bulk of the diet. Occasionally deer are killed and eaten, but near of the deer meat institute in bobcat stomachs has been feces. The bobcat also preys upon domestic sheep, goats and poultry. The predatory impairment is non nifty, except in rare instances.

The bobcat is the merely native Texas cat which is important as a fur brute.

Mount Lion (Puma, Cougar)

The mount panthera leo is an unspotted true cat. Males may exist as much equally 8 feet, 6 inches; females, six feet, 7 1/2 inches. Weight of 3 males averaged 184 (160-227) pounds; six females, 118 (105-133) pounds.

The mount lion ranges over much of the Trans-Pecos of W Texas, the southern ii-thirds of the Colina Country in Central Texas, and a large portion of the S Texas brushlands equally well every bit in limited areas in North Central Texas. Within this range, the cat is most common in remote, thinly populated ranchlands but may be encountered almost anywhere. Changing land use patterns accept resulted in reduced predator control efforts in many panthera leo-populated areas. As a consequence, lion populations currently appear to exist holding their own or increasing in the southern, central and western portions of the state.

Retiring and shy by nature, and largely nocturnal past addiction, the mount lion is seldom seen in its native haunts.

The diet of the mountain panthera leo consists most entirely of animal matter; but, like the domestic cat, it occasionally eats grasses and other vegetable matter. Deer and javelina are major food items; however, lions have been known to accept elk and bighorn sheep equally well every bit a multifariousness of smaller animals.

Contrary to popular stance, mountain lions rarely use caves as dens, preferring cliff crevices, overhanging ledges or enlarged badger burrows instead.

Except for a brusk convenance period of up to two weeks' elapsing, they lead a alone being.

Margay

Similar to the ocelot in colour and colour pattern, just smaller and more slender, is the margay. Full length is nigh 3 feet. Piddling is known of its breeding habits and food, simply opossums are included in its diet.

It is known from Texas only on the basis of one specimen have at Hawkeye Pass by Col. S. Cooper over 100 years ago.

Remains of this diminutive cat were plant in Pleistocene deposits forth the Sabine River in Orangish County, indicating the Margay ranged over a considerable portion of South Texas a few thousand years ago.

Jaguarundi

The jaguarundi is a little larger than the domestic true cat. It has two color phases, ane grayish, the other reddish. Length of males is about 3 feet, half dozen inches, of which the tail is more than half.

Considered extremely rare in Texas, the sleek low-slung jaguarundi inhabits the castor land of farthermost southern Texas in Cameron, Hidalgo, Starr and Willacy counties. It reportedly eats rats, mice, birds and rabbits. Of all the cats, this one excels in power to leap and bound, considering its size. No data is bachelor on habitation life, growth and development. Numerous sightings of this species are reported each year, but they are difficult to verify considering of the similarity to wild house cats.

The clearing of brushlands in the Rio Grande Valley threatens to destroy habitat in Texas.

*Wild populations of jaguarundi are believed to be currently extirpated from Texas.

Jaguar

The jaguar is the largest and almost robust of the spotted American cats. Big males may grow every bit long as seven feet and weigh up to 200 pounds. Seldom venturing into the high, cooler inland areas, El Tigre inhabits the dense chaparral and timbered areas of the New World Tropics. This elegant true cat shows a particular fondness for water-side habitats. It is extremely unlikely that this cat occurs in Texas although a rare visit by a wanderer from United mexican states is possible. Last verified Texas records date from the plough of the century. The jaguar is now considered by most authorities to be extirpated from the land. Its nutrient habits are not well known. In United mexican states, it is known to prey on peccaries and in the Amazon region information technology catches fruit-eating fish using its sharp claws every bit gaff hooks, and it probably preys on deer and large footing-home birds when such items are available.

Dr. E. W. Nelson reported that information technology is also fond of sea turtle eggs. The jaguar roams the beaches on spring nights, digs upward the turtle eggs and enjoys a delectable repast.

Domestic(Feral Cat)

While the domestic true cat has adapted itself in extraordinary style to man'southward customs, it has not altogether lost its wild traits. Often sleek, sleepy, and well-behaved by day, the cat, by dark, may become a stealthy and serious predator.

In the course of a bobwhite quail experiment in East Texas, cats killed 8 quail and 10 cardinals in the experiment traps, on one occasion 6 quail at one time.

Cats also are known to catch and consume cotton fiber rats and pocket gophers, and according to studies in Texas, cats consume Attwater's prairie chickens, meadowlarks, chicken flesh and feathers.

Ocelot

The Ocelot is the most beautiful Texas cat. It is unique in that no two ocelot pelts are akin. Adult males may be as much as 3 feet, 10 inches long; females up to 3 feet. Weight is 20-35 pounds. Although the ocelot's nutrient habits have not been adamant completely, information technology has been reported that birds, including domestic poultry, are captured on their roosts. Rabbits, wood rats, mice of many kinds, likewise every bit snakes and other reptiles, are also important items in the ocelot's diet. At present restricted to several isolated patches of suitable habitat in three or four counties of the Rio Grande Plains, the ocelot once ranged over the unabridged southern part of the state, with occasional records from n and central Texas.

Its population in Texas is chiefly threatened past habitat loss resulting from conversion of naturally-vegetated areas to agricultural land in South Texas and the Rio Grande Valley. Recent studies by the U.South. Fish and Wildlife Service and Texas Parks and Wildlife reveal that the ocelot is still found in scattered native brush areas of S Texas and some of these cats may now be using more open rangeland.