In June 2020, biologists from the State Office for the Environment (LfU) and foresters released the female lynx Julchen in the forests on the Upper Franconian Ochsenkopf. Julchen was an orphaned cub from the Bavarian Forest that had previously been nursed back to health. The lynx experts had high hopes that one day a cow would move to the region and that Julchen would have offspring. This summer it was time. In mid-July, a young lynx fell into a camera trap on Ochsenkopf. The hopes of the time have thus been fulfilled. Julchen has had at least one cub. In addition to the Bavarian Forest and the Steinwald in the Upper Palatinate, there is now a third, albeit tiny, lynx population in the Free State.
Lynxes have a hard time in Bavaria. The big cats were once widespread. But they were little suffered. The hunters saw them as competitors, the farmers feared for their farm animals on the pastures. So the lynx were hunted ruthlessly. By the middle of the 19th century they had been exterminated. Lynxes, which have been strictly protected for a long time, are among the most fascinating native animals. Simply because of their yellow-brown spotted fur, which is so individually drawn that experts can identify every lynx by it. But also because of the strong hair brushes on the ears and the pronounced whiskers. And then there is their fine hearing, with which they can hear the soft rustling of a mouse from 50 meters away. They also do phenomenal sprints. When chasing a deer or other prey, they can accelerate up to 70 km/h.
The father of the young lynx at Ochsenkopf immigrated from the Steinwald. The small low mountain range is only about 30 kilometers as the crow flies from the Fichtelgebirge. He is a good two years old and comes from the first litter of a lynx female in the local region. As is usual with male lynxes, he left his mother and siblings when he was almost a year old and looked for his own territory. He found what he was looking for at Ochsenkopf. Also at the end of July, a severely weakened young lynx was caught in the Bavarian Forest. His mother could not be traced. The young animal is fed in a species protection station, when it is fit it should be released into the wild. The northern Upper Palatinate and the Fichtelgebirge offer themselves as a new home region for the young lynx – so that the small population there can consolidate.