‘It was amazing’: Lynx seen chasing squirrel through treetops near Drayton Valley

March 30: Lynx seen in treetops near Drayton Valley Video submitted by a CTV viewer shows a lynx climbing in the treetops Thursday morning.

Ken Nicholson was driving to a central Alberta worksite Thursday morning, when he caught a young lynx going to great heights to catch a squirrel.

Nicholson, a battery operator, said he was driving outside Drayton Valley when he encountered two of the big cats.

“I work about an hour west of Drayton Valley, and I was driving down a road on my way to my next site, and that’s when I noticed it,” Nicholson said.

“A lynx ran across in front of my truck – they typically don’t have a fear of humans, not very much anyways…I drove up to it and parked and started videotaping this lynx in the trees.”

Nicholson said at this point, the animal started making noises, which led him to believe it may have been a mother with kittens in the area – so he started looking to see if there were any young around.

“I’m looking along the ground to see if there’s kittens, that’s when I noticed the movement up in the tree, this lynx was trying to catch the squirrel,” Nicholson said.

The avid outdoorsman said he hadn’t seen a lynx display this type of behaviour in the past.

“It was amazing, I’ve never heard of or seen anything like that before,” Nicholson said. “I know lynx just don’t typically, aren’t in trees that often I suppose. It was definitely a rare sight.”

Luckily for both creatures, the squirrel managed to get away unharmed, and the lynx quickly made its way back down to the ground moments later.

“He gave up pretty quick, he knew he wasn’t going to catch that squirrel,” Nicholson said. After the animal came down, it met the other lynx on the road, and both disappeared into the woods.

Nicholson sent the video to CTV Edmonton Thursday afternoon - the video has been viewed tens of thousands of times since it was posted.