Of Lynx and Moose

This is a piece of fiction written by the undersigned when he was 15 years of age and in Grade 9 (1957) at Oakdene School. I retrieved this copy from the 1957-1958 Digby Regional High yearbook Fundy Light. While memory suggests it may have first been published in the 1957 version of the Oakdene Yearbook Oakdene Hi-Lite, I no longer can confirm such. However, I do recall I was surprised to see it Fundy Light, and certainly was not in any way involved it it’s being there. I do have to thank someone with the foresight to include it in the high school yearbook, if for no other reason than that was a good “filing cabinet”. The version herein has been copied, including punctuation, directly from the yearbook. While I would probably change some small portion of the of the punctuation today, the 1957 punctuation stands on its own. In hand copying the text I did run across two inaccuracies therein; both were left intact and marked in this version by [sic]. The first was that I had initially placed the scar over the lynx’s left eye and later attributed it to being over her right eye; the second was a simple spelling mistake where the text had “stain” and it should have been “attain”.

Of interest, at the time of writing the story I had never seen a lynx; they had been extirpated from the NS mainland before my time. I had seen one moose when I was about 5 years of age, a forlorn, staggering, tick-infected individual slowing dying of brain worm on the road not far from Lake Jolly; she was not the model for the cow moose in the story. In the intervening years I’ve seen multitudinous moose – from the highway, from the water, from the air, and in the bush. I did see a cow and a newborn calf on Whitesand stream in 1960 and she left me no doubt about the need to stay away from her calf! That, and a yearling moose encounter in 1993, described in the adjoining essay on the Hunt Camp, helped confirm that my description of the furry of the cow moose in the story was close to realistic. 

As for the lynx, for some inexplicable reason I have always liked cats, even though as a kid I was only directly exposed to a house cat for about 6 months. There were bobcats about southwestern Nova Scotia in the 1950s but I never had the yearned-for encounter. Maybe I simply intuitively liked their secretive manner. I finally saw two in headlights on the highway in separate Ontario encounters in the early 2000s. The notion of a lynx back in the day inevitably moved my mind off to the ‘great north woods’, a place that acted as a drawing card for my young and fertile teenage consciousness. I loved the notion of a lynx; I can recall vividly everyone I’ve ever seen.

I saw my first lynx in May of 1964 in Northern Manitoba from a jackpine covered ridge at perhaps 8.30 am on a cold sunny morning as it sat on its haunches on a shoreline perhaps 500 feet away enjoying its captured sunbeam with its eyes closed; a beautiful sight and we moved on without disturbing it.  Subsequent encounters included passing one in a boat basking on a shoreline outcrop one sunny mid-July evening at about 7.30 pm, and another seven, including one mom and two kits, from vehicles on Northern Ontario roads; two of the seven were simply stretched out on the highway right-of-way in the sun while the other five were crossing the road. My most memorial encounter was at Shebandowan Lake while having dinner with friends at their camp in perhaps 2005, when one casually walked around the east corner of the camp, along the available outcrop in front of the picture window where it paused for a moment, and then casually down the path toward the boathouse. In all, the cat was in sight probably all of 30 seconds, but the detail of the event is still firmly imprinted on my mind even today.  

Since 1975 I have become infatuated on the notion of seeing one of Ontario’s furtive cougars but so far, no luck! The closest I knowingly have come is a picture on a trail camera at a spot perhaps 15 kilometres from home. Hope springs eternal!

Do, or Die.

From her position on the outcrop of the rock, about halfway up the west slope of the mountain, the lynx viewed the valley in which she would have to hunt until her kittens were old enough to travel. She was an old lynx, and she showed it. She had a scar over her left eye, from an encounter with moose in her younger days, and a large piece of her right ear was missing. The long hairs on her back had turned from their natural color of reddish-brown to a grizzly-gray and her eyes, although her eyesight was perfect, had lost some of the luster of younger years. Even thought she was getting old, she was big; and her experience and size made up for what old age had taken out of her. Because of her craftiness the Indians of that part of northern British Columbia had named her Mawaga – the crafty one.

One of her five-day old kittens in the den behind her started mewing. Mawaga went back, looked them over, licked them and started nursing them.  She had been driven out of her range further north during the winter because disease had killed off most of the rabbits, and the foxes, not able to find many rabbits, which are their mainstay, had killed off the partridge while trying to survive. Because of the scarcity of food, she had wandered south and east during the winter, hunting and looking for a new range. She had found nothing suitable until just before her kittens were born when she came upon this valley. She had started surveying it but had not finished because she had had to look for a den for her expected family.

Since the kittens had been born five days ago, snow, sometimes mixed with rain, which had come sweeping down on an icy wind from the mountain tops, had been swirling about the cave mouth. In these five days all the old lynx had to eat was one rabbit. She had hunted as much as possible but the animals had all taken shelter and were not moving about; hence, she would find no fresh scent to follow. Now with most of the milk drained from her body, she must find food in order to replenish her supply and keep her kittens alive. Today should be a good day for hunting, because the snow had just stopped falling and if there were any rabbits or partridge left in the valley, they would surely be out finding food for themselves.

Getting up and going back on the outcrop, the old lynx selected the place where she thought the highest concentration of small animals would be, in the alders along the stream, swollen from the rain and melting snow of the late spring blizzard. Picking her way down the mountain-side, she came to the valley floor at a point about half a mile from the stream. Angling off a bit to the north, she moved slowly through the thickets, trying to pick up the scent of her next meal. By the time she reached the river she had come across only one rabbit track and following that found where a fox had a meal of it about ten minutes before. The fox, she thought, would do for food only if nothing else could be found to eat.

She started off downstream towards the alders having only one thought; the thought of finding something to eat so she could keep her kittens alive. After hunting for over two hours without finding a thing, she was becoming desperate. While she was going around a bend in the river the wind brought a scent that made her nostrils quiver with excitement. She tested the air several time. Yes, it was a moose! Moving more cautiously now, she angled away from the river so she would be down wind of the animal and advanced slowly. If it should be a bull, in descent condition, she would give him a wide berth because even if his antlers were shed, he would still be a dangerous enemy. On the other hand, if it should be a cow with a newborn calf, it would be possible to kill the calf while the moose was browsing on the maple shoots on the ridge which closed in the lower end of the valley. But the scar over her right [sic] eye reminded her of what would happen if the cow caught her. Those front hooves were razor-sharp and as quick as lightening.

Still moving upwind, the lynx saw through the trees a small opening with a few young firs in it and surrounded by softwood mixed with small stands of hardwood. Peering from behind a large fir, she saw nothing and was about to slip into the clearing when a large cow moose beat her to it. The moose, coming from behind a few small firs and followed by a calf wobbling on its legs which looked six sizes too large for it, went to the center of the clearing and looked around. Saliva started flowing and the lynx could hardly hold herself back, but she knew if she tried anything now she would probably never even see her kittens again, let alone feed them. So she moved back in the thicket and settled down to wait for the cow to leave. A rabbit, seemingly coming from nowhere, hopped in front of her, and a few minutes later another one off to one side, but so intent was she on the moose that they couldn’t distract.

About noon the cow made a last check of the clearing and the immediate surroundings, and, not hearing, seeing or smelling anything, took one last look at her dozing calf and set out for the ridge. The lynx, from her position in the woods saw the cow leave and waited a short time before moving. Then slinking from on tree to another she moved up until she was concealed from the view of the calf behind a small fir at the edge of the clearing. She paused a moment and after looking the situation over began stalking the moose by moving from one small fir to another, her feet going down so silently it seemed she had been practicing for this one moment all her life and her eyes fixed on the sleeping form with the look of menacing fascination that only cats have. Finally she had run out of cover about twenty-five yards from the moose and it had hypnotized her so that there seemed to be nothing else in the world except the moose and herself.

The moose, though very young, still had the instinct of preservation and was periodically checking its surroundings between naps. The cat waited until it was asleep and started across the clearing at a run. With one deft motion she was on the sleeping form and had her fangs into the throat before the moose knew what happened. Blood filled her mouth and it tasted good.

So intent on the calf had the old lynx been, that she had not heard the noise at the edge of the clearing. The cow moose, having a premonition that something was wrong, had not gone all the way to the ridge but turned back because the safety of her calf had had more effect on her than hunger. In seeing the cat standing over her calf she let out an enraged bellow and charged out of the firs with eyes blazing and vapour streaming from her nostrils. The old lynx, upon hearing the noise, whirled and prepared to meet the charge with fangs bared. Partly because of hunger and partly because instinct said the dead calf was hers, the old lynx was prepared to fight.

The moose went up on her hind legs and thrashed in blind fury at the cat, but, because she was so mad, her timing was off. The cat ducked, did a about turn and landed on the moose's back, claws raking either side and fangs trying for the moose’s throat. This brought the moose back to her senses and she immediately ran for a spruce with some low branches. The cat, trying to reach the moose’s vulnerable jugular, didn’t see them and one caught her squarely on the chest and sent her sprawling in the snow. The moose then bore down on the cat like a forest fire sweeping through a stand of dry pine, but by some miracle, missed the cat by inches with those skull-smashing hooves. The cat wheeled, spat, and looked for another opening at the moose’s throat. The moose made another attempt at the cat and this time the lynx was hit a glancing blow on the head which sent her reeling into the butt of a large spruce. Dazed, but not cut, the cat lay there a few seconds and was only saver because the moose had lost sight of her and was trashing around in some low bushes. The lynx got up and at the same time the moose spied her and charged. By this time the lynx saw she was fighting a loosing battle and bounded up the nearest tree. Out on a limb of spruce she went and watched, her blazing green eyes filled with fury, the moose snorting and bellowing below.             

The cat knew that she would have to wait until the moose, which was pawing the ground and thrashing at the spruce with uncontrollable fury left before she could stain [sic] her prize and the look of defiance in those bloodshot eyes made her realize that minutes would run into hours and possibly days before the moose would leave. Once, when the cow went over to examine the dead calf, the old cat tried to get down, but the moose was right there, pawing the air and the lower branches of the spruce, and snorting. Remembering her kittens, the lynx knew she must get back to them as soon as possible. As for the dead moose, she wouldn’t bother it for a couple of days because the cow would probably be in the vicinity and she could probably catch one or two of those rabbits which she now recalled seeing when she was in the thicket.

As the day wore on, the moose would go to the side of its little one more often and for longer periods, but she always had an eye on old Magawa. That night under the cover of darkness and because the vigilance of the moose was not as sharp as it had been during the day, the cat finally managed to reach the ground. But the moment the cat left the safety of her tree, the moose was after her, snorting and bellowing. The lynx, having good eyesight and able because of its size, to make good time through the thicket in the dark, got away, but not without a send-off from the moose. One of those razor-sharp hoofs caught her in the hind quarters, but it wasn’t a direct blow and only slowed her down a little. The amount she was slowed down didn’t hinder her too much and she finally lost the moose after it had followed her for a half mile or so.

While trying to get her breath at the base of a large hemlock, the lynx saw a rabbit coming toward her through the thicket. She waited until it had advanced close enough and then pounced. The rabbit’s squeals were cut off by the snapping of the vertebrae as the lynx bit through the backbone. After a short rest and a good meal, she headed for her den and her kittens. Along the way she had the good fortune to kill two more rabbits. Now her young would have milk and in a couple days she could go back and feast on the tender calf moose.

The soft purring coming from the den’s mouth told of a happy mother lynx. There were plenty of rabbits left in the valley and the lynx would be able to get food for a week if she could keep foxes, weasels, ravens, and numerous other scavengers away from it. At least, she and her kittens would be safe from starvation. Again she had proved the law of the wild by which she had lived for so long, “Kill or be killed; eat or be eaten.”

Ray Riley/1957