ISABELLA— Early last spring, Gary Olson, a Superior National Forest volunteer, discovered a Canada lynx carcass lying along a forest road near Isabella.
Little remained of the carcass except some hair and most of the skeleton (the skull was missing). Through detective work, Superior NF wildlife staff were able to figure out the cat’s identity. A sample of the hair from a front paw was sent to the forest service’s Rocky Mountain Research Station, which was able to match the DNA with an animal already in their data base, a female known as GLNR-S-571, aka “The Trappers Lake Female.”
From 2014 to 2024, wildlife staff and volunteers on the Superior collected 27 scats (lynx feces) from this individual spanning an area of about 71 square miles. GLNR-S-571 was born in the Isabella area in 2013 making this lynx 11 years old at the time of her death. Her breeding territory over the years spanned from Isabella to 12 miles northwest and 13 miles northeast.
The cat was old enough that her end could have been natural causes, but due to the advanced state of decay we cannot rule out a vehicle collision, predation, or other possible causes of mortality. She had many litters of kittens through the years. Through DNA analysis, there is a high level of confidence that GLNR-S-571 had offspring with her each year from 2019 to 2024 (at least 10 individuals), and it is highly likely that she had other litters prior to 2019 that were not detected. The team is hopeful that she will be survived by them and they will be looking to detect those kittens in the coming monitoring seasons.
Another impressive lynx on the Superior is GLNR-S-551, another female in the Isabella area who is now the oldest lynx in the Superior’s database at 11 years old (first detection in 2013).
“Canada lynx GLNR-S-571 is one of only three out of 538 lynx in the Superior’s DNA database documented to be older than eight years of age,” noted Dan Ryan, a wildlife biologist with the Superior. “Both 571 and 551 were found last winter and were known to be 11 years of age and both had kittens last winter.  Generally, if they make it past being a kitten and figure out how to provide for themselves, their survival rate is pretty good,” said Ryan.