Bobcats live in every contiguous U.S. state except Delaware. With an estimated population between 2.3 and 3.6 million, they are the most abundant wild cat in North America and one of the most adaptable predators on the continent. Their range stretches from the forests of Maine to the deserts of Arizona, and their numbers have more than doubled since the early 1980s.
States and Regions With Bobcats
Bobcats are present across the entire lower 48, though their density varies dramatically by region. The Southeast, from Texas to the Carolinas, supports some of the densest populations thanks to a combination of mild winters, thick brush, and abundant prey. Western states like California, Colorado, and New Mexico also have strong populations spread across rugged, open terrain. In the Northeast, bobcats are well established from Pennsylvania through New England, particularly in the forested mountain corridors of the Appalachians and Adirondacks.
The Midwest is where the story gets more interesting. Bobcats were wiped out across much of this region in the mid-1800s due to habitat loss and unregulated hunting. Over the past few decades, they’ve been steadily recolonizing their former range. Ohio, for example, listed bobcats as endangered until 2012, then downgraded them to threatened, and fully delisted them by 2014. Sightings in Ohio have increased significantly, spreading from the forested southeastern part of the state into areas with little forest cover. Similar recoveries have occurred in Indiana, Illinois, and Iowa, where bobcats are now regularly spotted in areas they hadn’t occupied for over a century.
Populations are stable or increasing in 40 states. Only Florida has reported declining numbers. Six states have been unable to confirm a clear trend. The national population estimate of 2.3 to 3.6 million is a dramatic jump from the 725,000 to 1,017,000 estimated in 1981.
Habitats They Prefer
Bobcats are habitat generalists, which is part of why they’ve succeeded across such a wide geographic range. They occupy forests, semi-deserts, mountains, brushland, and swampy lowlands. What they need most is dense cover for stalking prey and hidden spots for denning. They sleep in hollow trees, rock crevices, thick brush piles, or any sheltered space that keeps them concealed during the day.
Habitat quality directly shapes how much space each bobcat needs. In New York’s Adirondack Mountains, where forests are vast but prey can be sparse, male bobcats roam home ranges averaging 136 square miles. Females in the same area average 33 square miles. Compare that to the Catskill Mountains, where habitat is richer: males there average just 14 square miles, and females average 12. When food and cover are plentiful, bobcats don’t need to wander far.
What They Eat in Different Regions
Bobcats eat whatever small to mid-sized animals are most available locally, which means their diet shifts considerably from one part of the country to another. In the Southeast, cottontail rabbits and cotton rats make up the bulk of their meals year-round. From Florida to Louisiana, cotton rats tend to be the primary food source. In the mountains of eastern Tennessee and western North Carolina, woodland voles and birds become more important. In the interior highlands of Arkansas, fox squirrels and gray squirrels are key prey.
Out West, the diet tilts toward woodrats and other rodents. In central Arizona, studies found bobcat diets consisted of roughly 60 percent rabbits, 20 percent woodrats, and 10 percent ground squirrels. This flexibility is a major reason bobcats thrive in such varied landscapes. They aren’t dependent on a single prey species the way some predators are.
Bobcats in Cities and Suburbs
Bobcats are increasingly showing up in suburban and even urban areas, particularly in western cities where development pushes into their habitat. Los Angeles is one of the best-documented examples. Researchers have tracked bobcats in neighborhoods like Los Feliz and Silver Lake, sometimes within small green spaces sandwiched between dense development. Ear-tagged individuals have been spotted moving between fragmented patches of habitat surprisingly close to downtown.
Urban bobcats face real challenges, including vehicle strikes, rat poison exposure, and shrinking corridors between habitat patches. But they also find opportunity. Backyards support populations of rabbits, squirrels, and rats that bobcats readily hunt. Their largely nocturnal and secretive behavior means many residents never realize a bobcat is living nearby. If you live near a greenway, canyon, or wooded park in the suburbs, there’s a reasonable chance bobcats pass through your area, even if you’ve never seen one.
Where Bobcats Are Expanding
The most significant range expansion is happening in the Midwest and parts of the Northeast, where bobcats are reclaiming territory they lost more than a century ago. In Ohio, the highest habitat suitability is concentrated in the eastern and southeastern parts of the state, near established populations in Kentucky and West Virginia. These forested regions had the earliest and most consistent modern-day sightings. But since 2016, bobcats have been spotted in northern, central, and even northwestern Ohio, areas dominated by intensive agriculture with very little natural cover. These sightings likely represent animals dispersing through low-quality habitat, feeling out new territory.
Bobcats can thrive in surprisingly fragmented landscapes. Northeastern Ohio, a patchwork of forest, farmland, and suburban development, shows intermediate habitat suitability, and sightings there are increasing. The southern border with Kentucky and the southwestern border with Indiana also show high suitability, serving as corridors for animals moving into the state. This pattern of recolonization, starting from nearby source populations and gradually pushing into less ideal habitat, is playing out across multiple Midwestern states simultaneously.
The number of states reporting increasing bobcat populations grew from 20 to 32 between 1996 and the most recent survey period. Decades of regulated hunting seasons, habitat management, and legal protections during vulnerable population lows have collectively fueled this recovery. Bobcats are now one of the clearest success stories in North American wildlife management.