Texas Man almost stepped on this Humongous Rattlesnake

Am Shooting Journal ^ | 10/17/2017 | C Bailey

[rustbucket]

Not a bobcat; too much tail...

Here is a closeup of a dead bobcat sporting a tail much like that of the cat above whose identity you question. The identity of the bobcat in my photo below was confirmed by a biologist at Laguna Atascosa National Wildlife Refuge.

[TXnMA]

Thanks! I guess there are (regional?) variations. The last one I saw here in northeastern Texas fooled me: when it crossed the county road right in front of us, I thought, at first, that it was a Boxer dog with short-cropped tail & ears.

Then, it hopped up on a log, turned and looked at us, and, it obviously was a big cat.

As I said, the tail was just a stub that stuck up like a Boxer dog's and it was almost as big -- and, darker than these in the photos...

We've heard them at night, and the one I saw was under a half mile from our house in the Piney Woods.

[rustbucket]

They are beautiful animals. We came upon this one dead by the side of a road in South Texas very early one morning. A car must have hit it.

I showed the photo of it to the staff at Laguna Atascosa NWR, my destination for the morning. I was sure it was a bobcat, but I wanted confirmation from the staff there that it wasn't one of the rare ocelots from their Refuge. When my wife and I drove back on that road a few hours later, the carcass was gone. We think somebody picked it up for the skin or to take it to a taxidermist because it was in such good shape (aside from being dead). Its fur was in perfect condition.