THE CANADIAN LYNX. 
Lynx canadensis. 
Plate XII. 
The Canadian Lynx belongs to a small but well-marked section of the Feline family, the genus Lynx of 
Naturalists, which ditfers from the typical Cats in the absence of the small anterior prsemolar tooth, and other 
slighter peculiarities. We have two species of this form in Europe— Lynx cervaria, the Loup-cervier, in the 
North, and L.pardina in Piedmont and Spain; while in the United States of America there are three others 
found besides the present species. 
The Canadian Lynx has an extensive range in North America, and according to Mr. Smith, Secretary to 
the Hudson’s Bay Company, to whose exertions the Zoological Society are indebted for many interesting 
additions to their menagerie, is found all along the northern shore of the gulf of St. Lawrence, in the 
St. Maurice, Lac des Sables, Lake of Two Mountains, Ottawa River, and Lake Huron Districts; throughout 
the Regions of Lake Superior, and all across the Wooded Districts bordering the plains. The other three 
Lynxes of the United States, namely, the American Lynx ( Lynx rufa), the Texan Lynx ( Lynx maculata ) and 
the Red Lynx (Lynx fasdaia) are more Southern in locality, and of smaller size. They are also distinguished 
in form by their having more naked soles to their feet, the pads of the feet in the Canadian Lynx being- 
overgrown with hair, so as to be completely concealed in the winter. 
When game and the smaller mammalia on which it feeds are abundant, the Canadian Lynx appears in 
great numbers in the territory of the Hudson’s Bay Company. In six years (1845 to 1850 inclusive) the 
Company imported 173,523 skins; the largest number obtained in any one year being 47,063, in 1848. The 
activity of the hunters during this period appears to have thinned down the Lynx considerably; and, as a 
consequence, the supply gradually decreased, until in 1853 it only amounted to 4,850 skins. 
The Society have frequently possessed specimens of the Canadian Lynx, as also of the two European 
species, and of the Bay Lynx or American Lynx of the United States. In captivity all Lynxes are very shy and 
distrustful, seldom moving about except at night, and receiving the visitor, if he approaches at all near the 
bars of their cages, with angry spittings and scratchings. They do not seem to bear confinement easily, 
seldom having lived for long periods in the Society’s Gardens. Of five examples of the Lynx of Northern 
Europe, which have been in our Menagerie, none lived many days over the first year ; and of three of the 
Canadian Lynx, which have been exhibited at various times, the longest liver barely passed three years in 
captivity. 
