A Bobcat Sought Refuge From the Heat

And found it on my back porch!!!

One recent afternoon during our endless summer it was once again over 100°. I went outside around 5:00PM to do my last home exercise of the day, carrying a kettlebell back and forth, only to find that I had disturbed a Bobcat on my porch. I saw it hop over the sitting wall and stop, staring at me from the desert. I turned back to the house, both to give the cat space and to get my camera. By the time I stepped back outside again, the Bobcat had returned to the wall.

I stood inside the house but at the open kitchen door. The Bobcat watched me for a few seconds before deciding that I wasn’t about to disrupt it again.

Upon reaching the ground, it paused again just to be sure we understood each other. From the shot I could tell this was a male bobcat.

And this is why the Bobcat was here with the temperature well over 100°. It crawled under the pots and began to rest in the cool and moist shade. My drip irrigation system runs for a few minutes three times a day during the hottest part of the summer. The soil and debris under the pots remain moist and cool even on the hottest of days. I couldn’t get a good look from the kitchen door and did not want to walk onto the porch and disturb the Bobcat. If you look closely, you can see its nose on the ground just to the left of the black, metal foot of the plant stand. Time for a cat nap!

I sat at the open kitchen door and waited. After about a half hour, the cat woke up. In the shot below you can find an open eye staring through the lavender leaves at me.

It soon got up, hopefully cooled and refreshed. It glanced at me......

.....yawned.....

.....and then hopped onto the sitting wall and looked into the desert. I find it interesting that even though the bobcat was looking away from me, its left ear was turned to the side or back just to be able to hear whether or not I might try approaching it.

And then it was gone. It rained the next morning and I was thrilled to receive just over an inch of rain. Part of me, however, was sort of hoping for more very hot afternoons where my porch might offer one of the few cool spots in the neighborhood.