Return of the Jaguar?

(2007) My wife and I seen a large cat cross the road on 48 near Durant OK. A large cat had to be scared out of a garage in Tishimago. Both were black!! Do cougars came black?

This past Saturday 06/21/08, 5 people saw a large black cat in the woods behind my lake house. My sister tried to take a picture of it, but only the eyes flashed from the camera. She sent the picture to a cougar web-site and they said that cougars would flash green eyes and since these were yellow it had to be a Jaguar. I live at Lake Wauwanoka, Hillsboro, MO. Please respond. Could it be someone's pet?? It was the size of a large dog. Sincerely, Kathy

My brother-in-law (who is sane, sober, and wide-awake)clearly saw a cougar-sized, long-tailed cat cross the road in front of him, in his headlights, a mile from our home. We are in west TN, four miles from the river, about 20 miles north of Memphis. This cat, also, was black. We may have a jaguar, or are there dark-coated cougars?

My sons were in a creek in North Dallas this past June and two (age 22 and 24) of them saw a jaguar. City boys yes but these guys know their animals. It was about 30 feet across the creek and about 20 feet upstream, maybe 3:00 in the afternoon. They said it turned and saw them, and then eased on up into the brush. They were surprised by it's lack of panic. They weren't about to follow. This sounds strange but they were positive it was a jaguar.

In 1994, I was driving on highway 77 just outside Winkleman, Arizona I approched something big in the middle of the road. As I got closer I realized it was a dead animal. I pulled over and walked up to it, it was a cat, A very large black cat with brownish spots all over. At leased a dozen cars stopped after me so I got in my truck, and drove 2 miles to my friends house. They have to see this. We go back, and its gone. Somebody took it, and all that was left was a little spot of blood. Its still hard to get people to believe my story. But its TRUE......

I was speaking to a security guard at the Big Horn Country Club the other day. Big Horn is in Palm Desert, California. The woman said that a resident had called them at about 10 pm the previous evening. The resident was walking his dog and said he saw a large black cat, the size of a mountain lion. The security guard arrived and saw the cat too. They described it as a black panther. It sounds impossible since there have only been two jaguar sitings in the last decade in the United States, and they had mottled spots as most jaguars do.

Huntland, Tennessee in Franklin County. I’m 58 years old and when I was a boy approximately 12 years old an old lady that I delivered news papers to told me she saw our dog and several other neighborhood dogs chasing a black panther. It jumped the fence behind her house and escaped. The year was approximately 1962. In approximately 1963 my father was logging in the neighboring Jackson County Alabama. They were repairing the track on the bulldozer and it was getting dark. My father heard what he called a panther scream in the woods about 200 yards above them. He said they packed up their tools and went home. He had heard bobcats before, but he said that the sound of the scream was no bobcat. I worked with a guy that at the time of the sighting only lived 3 miles out of Huntland. On his way home one night a black panther ran across the road in front of him just a short way from his home. In 1998 my son and son in law and I were working with our hunting club in Franklin County taking fertilizer to the game plots. My son in law was in front of me on his four wheeler. He all of a sudden came to a halt. I had to dodge to miss him because of the bad brakes on my four wheeler. He said “did you see that”. He saw a black panther run across the jeep road about 20 yards in front of him. I didn’t see it, but have no doubt he did. I've heard of other reports of people seeing black panthers in this area and other areas of Tennessee. I believe they have been here all along, but in real low numbers.

For anyone curious about this, I live near Tucson where we have captured some of the photos of the Jaguars. I was watching Monster Quest on History Channel last night and it was about the large black cats being sited near OK and all across the midwest along with the Arizona sightings. Im sure you could find the episode on History channel's site or maybe Monster Quest. Even just Google it and you will pull up a lot of information on the subject. Thought maybe it would help someone!

Most of the accounts above are Cougars (Felis Concolor) or maybe a Jaguarundi (Herpailurus yaguarondi) for any southern sitings. Also, I can promise you that eye shine is totally unreliable. Cats (usually) have green that may switch to orange but can have green, orange, or red. Fox can have all those colors as well. Rats will show red or orange and even spiders will show enough glow to make you look twice. I.E.> eye shine won't determine kingdom, let alone species... If anyone wants to be taken seriously please, PLEASE get a photo. Your phone has a camera. I don't want to hear "I missed the shot" from a guy who catches every boob flash at Mardi Gras, I just want to see a frickin American Jaguar. Go out there and prove yourselves - Show Me A Jaguar!

Between Hobbs and Artesia New Mexico Hwy 529. Near dark. The year was 1976 and as my Father, uncle and I drove towards Hobbs I saw a large black cat cross the road. The tail was HUGE and very thick. My father (passenger) only say the tail and my uncle did not see it. I did not see its face but distinctly remember the back color. The area is mostly sand dunes and open rolling hills. I thought it was very strange to see any animal in this area but I know what I saw.

Study after study has shown that people are not very observant, and that when they do notice things they don't remember them correctly - in fact, they often exaggerate the size of things, especially animals. The funny thing about all these puma sightings is that the puma (AKA cougar, mountain lion, Florida panther, etc.) is never black. Leopards (who only live in the Old World) and jaguars (who during the ice age lived as far north as Nebraska and Pennsylvania, but in the U. S. today are restricted to areas close to the Mexican border) are only rarely black. So why is everybody seeing black panthers? Pumas are recolonizing their former range, but it will be a long time before we have breeding populations even in areas that would be fine puma habitat. And they didn't just stick around there after being hunting out a hundred years ago, because their prey was gone too. It is possible that people are seeing black jaguars or leopards that were raised as pets and then released, but these generally have no skills to survive, and get shot by police after they are spotted lounging at a bus stop or digging out of trashcans. People will scream "I know what I saw!" but they don't. Perhaps a few "black panther" sightings in the southwestern U. S. are legitimate, but most people simply saw a black lab, a dark bobcat, or a house cat.

Im a hunter and avid outdoorsman in NC and in TN. I have seen some strange animals near the cape fear river in NC but the other day when i was walking in the woods i saw a very large dark cat with spots on it. since i have seen many mountain lions before i knew it was not one. when i saw it i was so scared i jumped in and swam across rockfish creek. this cat was about waist high and was probably 150 pounds. i called the local game warden and he told me it was probably a black bear. i told him this was no bear i was ten yards away from it and i have hunted a few bears before. he told me the only cat that big and that color is a jaguar but they dont live in the U.S. i will be setting camera traps and will try to get evidence.

Indeed as child growing towards up my father and I did see great many Jaguar while hunting walrus in native Northeast Kallalit Nunaat. one indeed was seen eating my family repeatedly but no picture was taken of it by the me. It is supposed that they HAVE indeed traveled far to north, and are speckled still unlike mighty white bear, near pole, in north.

The first week of Nov 2009, I was up late one night when motion sensors turned on the lights outside my window. The house is near the Magee Rd & 1st Avenue trail-head in the Santa Catalina foothills, Tucson AZ. I was able to get a very good look at a large cat (smaller than Jaguar) but appeared to move and look like Jaguar. It had unusually long thick tail and dark spots on a light brownish-gray fur. Never stretched the legs to full while easily climbing the wall and disappearing on the cliff behind in dark looking back towards me. I had not seen anything like this before although the house is frequented by Havelinas and Bobcats even during the day hours. I must mention though that there is a large presence of big rats in the area maybe the food source and the house water fall outside my window.

Wed. afternoon ( 11/18/09) as I was walking by WASH#9 in Green Valley, Az. I observed a big black wildcat( height appeared to be that of a large dog...but this was no dog!) walking across the sandy ,dryed out river, about 75 yards away. Being from out of town, I really studied it , trying to figure out what I was looking at. It slinked into some trees and didn't come out....so I walked away. I researched it online and am pretty sure that what I saw was a black jaguar. We went back the next day and took pictures of footprints in the sand..which were huge and appeared anatomically correct. I did call the Arizona wildlife fish and game people to report it. But, I'm really curious to know if anyone else happaned to see it too! Now that I know how rare they are ( but not unheard of being 40 mls. from the Mexican border) , I'm totally amazed and blessed to have seen it! If only I'd had a camera!

As a wildlife biologist and felidae specialist i can assure you all that there are no jaguars in the north. They do not have the ability to survive the cold. The furthest north they possibly are are Texas and Arizona. No further north than that. Peroid. There are none in any northern states or in Canada. We'd like to all believe that was true but it simply isn't.

Some info for "wild cat lovers"--maybe mere trivia to some--
During the early 1970's, maybe late 60's, the Florida Wildlife magazine,( publ. by fla wildlife service) featured a fill length article on the jauguarundi (kinda miniature jaguar) sightings--then, prevalent all over florida). More recently so many exotic species have been 'liberated" or let out of cages to become pests all over florida!

In addition, The Forteans, a magazine for the strange and 'unexpected' facts main-line scientists tend to ignore, featured many panther sights, jaguar and black cat sightings thru the yrs...twenty or thrirty years now i guess.

We live on a small ranch outside of Reedley, California. There are two mountains in our area, one is going to be mined by CMEX. There is a female, part mountain lion and part jaguar that lives in this area. In 2004, she had two cubs. The male is the same color as a mountain lion but the female is much more of a cream or grayish creamy color. I didn't get close enough to see spots, but her mother deffinately has them. In early September, my husband and I were drinking coffee at about 6 a.m. on the front porch when we saw he come down into the pasture. She knew we were there but went on her way slowly. I think she now has two cubs. I was walking along the dirt road accross the street recently and saw her tracks where she had turned in a quarter circle and sat down. There were two sets of small tracks that swirled around her. The females brother is very large, about 150+/-. He lives not far away either. I guess he has a girlfriend from the wondervally area. The neighbors told be they've been a handful. Are cats like their mother protected? If the mother has rosettes even though she's part mountain lion, shouldn't she be protected? I am studying for a bachelors in science, wildlife biology. Taking a walk in our pasture with this kind of wildlife around is awsome. I know that mountain lions have a home range and a wider span of range in circumpherance, but all of these cats have a home range of about five miles in proximaty of each other. I'm not sure how to interpret this.

There is and always will be controversy over any eyewitness to an event without a photo. This is of course unfortunate as many eyewitnesses are relating factualobservations.With the advent of trail cams I would think that these will eventually disclose any rare cats occupying an area.

I am from Chicago. I lived in Northern Alabama for about 5 years in Marion County in between 2 relatively small towns Haleyville and Bear Creek. I used to go to work before sunrise every morning. Our neighbor had a big black dog named Rocky (a rotweiler). I was on my way to work one morning (appx. 3:30 a.m.) and I noticed before I started going around a curve on my dead end road, that there was a large black animal standing in the curve. I had always heard Black Panther stories, but considered them a tall southern tale because I was born and raised in Chicago, so I thought the animal was nothing more than my neighbor's dog Rocky. It turns out when I approached the animal in the Checvy Silverado that morning it was not at all a dog. I stopped to take a closer look. It was a black Panther. It crossed the country road right in front of the truck I was driving. It was mainly black with brownish - reddish rosettes covering it's body throughout. Its head stood taller than the truck hood and it's body appeared to be at least 6 ft in lgth. The eyes were green from a distance but once closer I noted that they were yellow. It was not intimidated by the truck or the noice of the glass packs the truck had on it at all. To all the skeptics out there, I understand why you don't want to believe it as science can not prove it, but ignorance is blessed in this country and I think we all need to wake up and realize that. This experience frightened me so bad that throughout the years I remained living at that place, I refused to go outside after dark and to this day when I visit you will not catch me outdoors after sunset. As for pictorial evidence, who is going to reach for a camera when a so called South American wild cat is in sight with the exception that you already have one in hand or are in reaching distance of one if you're not in a state of shock. Science is going to continue to deny this until somebody is seriously hurt or KILLED!!! I find that frightening.

For all those that feel it's not possible., I say nature finds a way! The garbage i hear like, they won't go that far north or its to cold, will likely be proven wrong. As wild pigs over-populate and deer number increase, these prey make it ever more likely that preditors will follow.

My family has owned a 600 ac farm in St. James, Mo for over 30 years used for hunting. I enjoy watching game through binnoculars from deer stands all over our farm. In June 2009 I noticed large black cats on the farm. After much research, I now know they are Jaguars, no doubt about it. They are making a come back in the U. S. I was blessed to watch them from the top of our abandoned barn for hours each day. I was surprised to see that there were black kittens, not sure how many but at least 4. They moved on after about 5 weeks. I am hoping they will return in June again this year.

To Carolyn,

We live in Tucson near 1st and Orange Grove. In July 2007 I saw a black jaguar from my rooftop slowly cross the street to east of our house. It was a completely unobstructed view and I thought it was a big shaggy dog when I first saw it and then realized it was a large short hair cat with very broad shoulders. Very glad I was on the rooftop when it walked by. I didn't realize it was a jaguar until 2 months later when I did a web search to show a friend from out of town what kind of animals we had in the area and dscovered that the only big black cats are either leopards (wrong continent) or jaguars.

A year later in a random conversation, I discovered that a friend and his wife who live about a mile to the northeast of us near Orange Grove Middle School had also seen a black jaguar walking in the wash right behind his house a few years before.

So he or she is out there

Back in 1989, when I was 15 years old my family and I made a fishing trip to Falcon Lake in South Texas. As we left our campsite to go to the nearby town for supplies we encountered a large cat about 30 yards in front of us. My father stopped the car as we watched it cross the dirt road. We couldnt believe it because it was spotted like a jaguar but we believed that it was almost impossible to have actually seen one since they were known to be long gone from texas. As we drove past the place where it had cross we rolled up our windows thinking it could come out of the brush and try to attack us but of course it had disappeared. When we arrived to the local supermarket my father told the store manager what we had seen and they said that they were somewhat common in the area and had been sighted for years. That experience is something that I would never forget and to say the least, we spent the rest of our trip sleeping in the car instead of the tent. As an adult I have returned to the lake with my own kids and ask the locals about any big cats in the area and they all mentioned that jaguars havent been seen for over 15 years but do get a lot of mountain lion sightings. Well, I thought I share my big cat story with you all.