Black cat

We get reports of "black cats" up here too. The venerable "eastern panther or cougar". I've never seen one, heard one, or have seen sign of one. I've always been of the opinion that the "black cats" that locals have seen running along the woodline of their "back 40" are probably fisher or otters. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif
 
To date, there are NO, pictures,carcasses,parts,pieces or bonified documentation of a black mt lion in existence,period. They don't exist,except in the minds and stories of late uncles and grandfathers.
I suppose this one will never die, some people still believe in UFOs and Sasquatch too.....simply amazing.
 
It seems like the elusive black panther topic comes up several times every year. We have thousands of lions in the western US, and hundreds of mt lions are killed each year and not a one is ever black. What makes it even less likely is that these stories come from parts of the country with more people and the fewest lions (if any). It is a myth that will probably never die completely.
 
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O.K. guys heres my 2 cents. I live in Fisher county, Texas, West central Texas, I have personaly seen a long tailed cat weighing approx. 60 or so pounds with a dark pigmented coat
not black like a jaguar but defenitly darker than a mountain lion. I decided it was a freak colored mexican long tail. Over the last 4 years the popularity of sightings has increased. I know these farmers and ranchers here and I believe them. I called 1 up one night, It would scream and move, scream and move and would never look at the light. I know we have long tailed cat of a dark color
black panthers doutful, Daark pigmented yes!!!
And their tail is very large and long. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/confused1.gif




In northeastern oklahoma just northeast of bartlesville i have seen such a cat too, dark colored 50-60 lbs. and the one thing that i remember thinking was *&#$ that's a big tail. i will never forgive myself for not having the digital cam with me that day.


wow i didn't even realize this was the same thread from a year ago. i feel like an *$@. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/crazy.gif /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smiliesmack.gif /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smiliesmack.gif /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smiliesmack.gif
 
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National Geographic Magazine published a photo years ago taken by a rancher near the mexican border, can't remember which state but I wanna say TX or AZ. It was definitely a full-grown jaguar.

I used to outfit in WY for biggame including lions. Saw lots over the years. One of the most common comments you get from people seeing their first lion is: "Wow, I didn't know their tails were that big around or that long!"

I wouldn't think it unusual at all to see a jaguar anywhere within a 100 miles of the mexican border.

Most of the cat guides in WY believed it was nothing for a lion to travel 80 or 100 miles if it wanted. A guy in Saratoga told me that years ago, he tracked a few collared lions with G&F, one tom traveled from the Elk Mountain area well down into Colorado; a distance of over 200 miles.

It seems hard to believe, but the extinct ivory billed woodpecker has been recorded and sighted recently in Arkansas.

None of this is worth getting excited about. Cats travel.

The only unbelievable information I've ever heard about lions is that they continue to protect them in California while they eat foxy california jogger girls in tight little shorts. That's just a waste of a good jogger in my mind.
 
Do a quick Google search and you can come up with photos of black jaguars and black leopards. Quite a few of them are in captivity in animal compounds. Will someone please show me a photo of a black mountain lion?
 
Someone mention Arizona Jaguars -

Here's a recent pic of one (of several) outside of Tucson caught on a game cameras


jaguar.jpg


No Arizona based reports of "black Jaguars" i'm aware of.

gee wiz stuff-

At least 60 jaguars were killed in Arizona and New Mexico in the 20th century, including two in the Rincon and Catalina mountains in 1902 (near Tucson). A female jaguar was shot as far north as the Grand Canyon in 1932, but the last female recorded in Arizona was in 1963 in the White Mountains. Cubs haven't been documented since the first decade of the 20th century, according to David Brown and Carlos Lopez Gonzalez's "Borderland Jaguars" (University of Utah, 2001).

Jaguars, the Western Hemisphere's biggest cat, may travel up to 500 miles searching for food or a mate.
 
i live in south carolina, and within the area that i hunt, there have been several sightings all by different people, all who are very reliable. one of these was my uncle, who saw one while deer hunting, but couldn't get a shot. all of the people, and several of them were women, specifically said that they were black, and were definetly a large cat, as big as a lab dog.
 
This is the northern most documented sighting as of 2004.

The photo was shot where the red star is. It's not in the U.S., but the border is only about 250mi away, well within the jaguar's range of travel for food/mating, so I suppose a sighting here is possible.

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bjaguarmexl.jpg



According to the article, melanistic pumas (mountain lions) have been reported.

"Melanism in jaguars has now been shown to be caused by a dominant mutation of a single gene (Pocock 1929, Kitchener 1991 and Sunquist and Sunquist 2002). Thus, melanism has been reported from a total of 13 of 36 species and 9 of 18 genera of the family Felidae (Wozencraft 1993) including (besides the jaguar): the leopard (Panthera pardus), lion (P. leo), tiger (P. tigris), caracal (Caracal caracal), tiger cat (Leopardus tigrinus), puma (Puma concolor), bobcat (Lynx rufus), margay (Leopardus wiedii), ocelot (L. pardalis), serval (Leptailurus serval), sand cat (Felis margarita), and kodkod (Oncifelis guigna)."


Full article (not to long, and very interesting) here:

http://dinets.travel.ru/blackjaguar.htm
 
I can't say that it was BLACK, but about 1 month ago I was going to a buddy's house that has been sitting empty for about 4 months (40 acres with a large pond). I got there just before dark, and was walking down to the pond. On the far side, about 150 yards across, was a very large cat. It was as big as a large dog, but shaped like a cat. It moved like a cat as it slinked back into the heavy brush. The thing that I remember most was the long tail. Until I started reading this thread, I did'nt know that some say black panthers don't exist. The cat I saw might not have been black, but it was a very dark color, and don't tell me I saw a large beaver or some other type of animal, because this was a cat. Call me what ever you like, but I know what I saw. the location is north Mississippi. I have had several people tell me of several of these cats down in the Starkville area of MS. I was a sober that day as I am right now. Word around here is that it is against the law to shoot one, as it is an endangered species. I did'nt know how endangered it was LOL

DD
 
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How many times do we have to say, "Show me some proof"?

Any evidence whatsover? There is NONE.

The reference in the article says they have been documented, but does not produce any documentation. Documentations would beeither:

1. An animal in hand
2. A photograph
3. A skin
4. A conclusive video

None of these exist. Don't you think if there were, we would have seen it by now? At least once in the last 150 years?
 
True, but I ain't never seen no bigfoot dead either, and we all know that they DO exist. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smiliesmack.gif /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grinning-smiley-003.gif /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif
 
One episode on the Discovery Channel a couple of years back talked about big cats where none should exist.
They had a picture from somwhere in England of a big black long tailed cat that they speculated was probably a leopard.
The talk with "experts" mentioned that the best possibility is for a domestically raised cub to be released into the wild, either by accident or on purpose.

Since the USA has very liberal laws on keeping big cats in most rural areas, I wonder if the "black cat" and most of the mountail lion sightings in areas where they aren't supposed to exist could in fact be released animals.

Sounds likely to me. In the areas where there are unconfirmed sightings and where there have not historically been wild populations within the last 100 years would make such a thing possible. The rarity of the sightings, tracks, and kills would also point to just one or two animals over a very large area. Not enough for a breeding population but enough to get rare sightings. Even within the group of people who keep such animals, albino and black leopards would be even more desirable to have and so if one or two did "accidentally" get away the chances of it being a non typical animal are much greater than such a possibility happening within a completely wild population.
 
The probability of a released or escaped black leopard in an area is far greater than a black mountain lion, which has never been proven to exist, wild or captive.
 
This whole thread began as one relating to black mountain lions. Like Bob made mention, the "evidence" was of a black(well, somewhat black) jaguar.
Three or four people, who have a third uncle who swears they seen one by gawd, does not evidence make.
Thus far, in recorded history at least, they just do not exist, why is that so hard to get you mind around? It's like bigfoot and UFOs, lots of stories but thinking people realize it's just urban myth and superstition, thus far, there is not one, single,shred of evidence, beyond a story.

As an aside, every time I look at that photo of the dark colored jag, it looks all the world to be WAY to fat,and not in the condition one would expect a wild cat to appear? Looks like someone did a bad dye job, on a neutered,captive jaguar to my eye.
 
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