Research overview: bobcat home ranges and habitat use in suburban landscapes

Bobcats are among the most adaptable felids at the urban edge, persisting in suburbs and exurban developments across North America by exploiting greenbelts, washes, golf courses and remnant natural patches. This overview synthesises telemetry and camera-trap research on how suburban bobcats configure home ranges around development, select cover, and shift activity to avoid people while exploiting edge-associated prey such as rabbits and rodents. It examines how road density, fragmentation and human activity shape their distribution, and how individual variation in boldness affects urban tolerance. The synthesis frames the bobcat as a model species for studying mesopredator persistence in human-dominated landscapes.