I would have been very happy with a shot like this....

A beautiful environmental of this cat! Cat is nice and clear and nicely placed in the frame. Greens look a bit oversaturated to me in the background

I would be more than happy to have this in my files Bob! Lovely clear view of the Bobcat, nice head turn and sweet setting with the wildflowers!

Thank you for the comments. I was a little discouraged, as I just got back from a month on the road with much less to show for it than I had hoped for. A broken (but repairable) EOS 5D II and a destroyed EF 1.4x didn't help much either. I enjoyed Morro Bay and Oro de Montana Park a lot, but the other California "watchable wildlife" locations we visited didn't yield much in the way of photography.

We scouted Eastman Lake and had two Bobcat sightings as well as plentifull Acorn Woodpeckers, Oak Titmouse, several Wrens and other birds that aren't where we live on brief evening and morning trips on our way south, so we made a point of scheduling five days of camping on our return trip. Unfortunately, Laurie couldn't get close to many of the birds and I didn't have any better luck photographing the Bobcats. I was lucky to photograph this male at all as he was much smarter than me. Although I am disapointed with the clutter and the amount I had to crop, It is better than last summer when I found a female with three kittens in eastern Oregon only to have the grass so tall due to unusual rain that I couldn't even get a photograph. Anyway, based on your comments I think I will spend a little more time on this photo and try to clean up and desaturate the background a little. Thank you again!

I can understand the disappointment given the effort, but I'd personally be thrilled with this shot. I like the little orange flowers surrounding the cat and this is nicely composed. The light on the face of the cat is very sweet and helps to highlight it from the background.

Here is a reworked version of this photo. I removed grain with Topaz and desaturated, darkened and softened the background, as well as slightly sharpened the Bobcat, with Power Retouch.