more onomatopoetic and mysterious cats

[Heike Bödeker]

At 13:29 14.08.03 -0600, Koontz John E wrote:
>It might not matter, once the term applied to a cat of any size, but I
>think bobcats and lynxes (Lynx spp.) do make fairly cat-like noises.  I'm
>not sure for mountain lions (Puma).  I've heard them described as
>"screaming," I think.

Both can produce a variety of a sounds actually, which I for one have a
hard time imagining how to mistake for a domestic cat. Alas, I'm better at
imitating these than describing in words (which is not so good for email,
but surely was fun working with consultants in 3D :-)). Indeed one of the
puma's calls has been described as sounding like a piercing scream by a
woman :-))) The voice quality of lynxes I'd describe as rougher, not at all
what one would naively expect of a "small cat" (which is less useful
category anyway, not to speak of that it even had been proposed to group
lynxes together with "big cats", just that lynxes seem around 4000 KY old
while the panthera group only appeared around 700 KY BP together with major
ecological restructurings, which also lead to the formation of the
Euraso-Beringian tundra steppe).

All the best,

Heike