Florida bobcat catches shark, drags it onto beach
Published 11:44 am Wednesday, April 8, 2015
- Bobcat kills shark
Bobcats have officially jumped the shark.
According to south Florida ABC affiliate Local 10, John Bailey, a local beach goer, snapped a photo Monday evening of what he described as a bobcat snatching a nearly four-foot shark out of the ocean and dragging it onto the beach.
The documentation of this hitherto unknown link in the coastal food chain has gone viral.
Bailey told Local 10 that when he first spotted the bobcat, it was staring at the shark while it fed on smaller fish in shallow water. Once the bobcat spotted Bailey, he said it abandoned its prey and ran into the woods.
Though the size of the cat has some questioning if it is perhaps a Florida panther, Liz Barraco, a spokesperson for the Florida Wildlife Commission, said, Bailey got it right.
“Several biologists here have confirmed that it is a bobcat,” Barraco said.
While she said they’re less than certain that the photo is real—”we’re not experts in Photoshop, obviously”—Barraco said the agency “has no reason to believe it’s a fake.”
As of Wednesday, the FWC’s Tuesday Facebook post about the wildlife wackiness, in which it assures the public that “there are no shark fishing regulations for bobcats, just people,” had been shared more than 6,000 times.