Rarely seen, but always watching, the lynx is more than a top predator, it’s an ecosystem specialist whose secrets we’re only beginning to unravel.

This wild cat is about the size of mid-sized dog – considerably smaller than the cougar, but taller than its southerly cousin, the bobcat.

Why? Its legs.

Though well suited for any landscape, the lynx absolutely dominates the winter. Those long legs are built for snow and their massive paws? They’re better than any snowshoe on the market place.

But lynx aren’t built for running. I mean, have you ever tried running in snowshoes?  

Which is fine, because they have the power of sight. Those huge, haunting yellow eyes are like those of an owl: they’re essentially night vision binoculars, allowing a lynx to see more than 75 metres away in the near dark.

And like an owl, lynx have absurd hearing, but they also have the ability to sense movement.

Say what? A sixth sense? Sort of.

The whiskers on their face and the tuffs above their ears allow them to hear in 3D, sensing the slightest movement in the forest and pinpoint its location.

And you thought cats were only good for TikTok views.

But as you know from every cat video ever, felines are secretive, sneaky and stealth – and the lynx is no different.

Its evolutionary superpower? The ability to combine these senses with the virtue of patience – waiting in a tree or in a hunting bed – and knowing exactly when to pounce on its unsuspecting prey: the snowshoe hare.

You see, lynx have evolved alongside the hare and their existence depends on them.

Since about 1925, the relationship between lynx and hare has been held up as the perfect example of a predator to prey relationship. When hare numbers boom, lynx numbers increase. When hare populations decline, lynx numbers decline as well because eating too few hare actually causes lynx to have fewer kittens or no litters at all.

But here’s the thing: we were kinda wrong.

Hares – like all rabbits – reproduce easily and frequently. They exist as the primary predator of plants on the forest floor. Without their grazing, the underbrush – particularly after a fire – will produce too many deciduous trees and bushes, changing the forest ecosystem for the worse.

But too much grazing? There won’t be enough food for beavers and moose. That means fewer wetlands. That means, well, bad things.

We long believed the lynx existed to maintain hare populations, but now we know it has other predators too. Owls. Foxes. The trees they love.

That’s right, when willows and alder trees are over grazed, they create a bitter, indigestible chemical that actually starves the hare and forces their population into decline.

Which begs the question: If lynx aren’t the primary predator of the hare, why do they exist at all?

Well, everything exists for a purpose, even if its purpose is to act as nature’s fail-safe.

In every ecosystem, there are redundancies – you know, just in case something goes wrong. If one system breaks down – say a changing climate means trees can longer produce their hare-starving chemical defence – the role of the lynx in maintaining hare populations becomes that much more important.

Then there’s this:

If the lynx is removed from the ecosystem, hare populations don’t necessarily explode – other predators simply take over from the lynx.

But what if those predator numbers explode? What unintended consequences will that have? And if a predator, once locked into to its own predator-to-prey relationship, shifts its focus to suddenly, more easily available food, what impact will that have? On prey populations no longer being hunted? On prey populations having to deal with new predators in higher numbers?

So often, science asks how, not why – but maybe we need to ask why more often. Because even in a world where we know more than at any point in human history, there is still so much we don’t know – so much we need to understand – so we can make the right decisions, the better decisions, for humanity, for nature and for its most reclusive citizens – the critically important snowshoe hare and its secretive nemesis, the Canada lynx.