Local woman claims to have seen 'panther' near Goldbug, Ky.see pic.

[B.D. Turner]

I know for a fact that we have big cats in North Carolina. In 2003 I was a small town police chief. Another officer and I rode out of town to check on a crack house in Duplin County. On the way out he was playing with the cars alley lights as we saw deer almost every night in the fields around town. We were driving along checking out the fields when a big black cat was seen about 40 yards across a cow pasture. When the light hit the cat it stopped and looked at us over his right shoulder. The other officer yelled "oh crap what's that!!?" I hit the brakes and we got a good look at a cat that was well over four feet long walking across the field. I backed up and tried to keep him in the light but he turned and ran away from us. Both of us are avid hunters and have seen everything that lives in the woods around here and neither have ever seen anything like the big cat we saw that night.

 

[wheelgunslinger]

As long as I've been deer hunting and backpacking/hiking in western NC, I've been seeing tracks. Twice I've seen them. Once, standing stock still until I made it and it disappeared over a ridge quietly, and once I saw that big puffy tail disappearing behind a tree.

Recently, I heard one yowling at the end of the drive at night.

In Boone, people have been hearing them for years in the backcountry.

I've been documenting their history and upsurge of sightings for quite some time. I have a special interest in them. They're pretty incredible animals.

 

[conw]

In Boone, people have been hearing them for years in the backcountry.

I lived 45-60 min away from Boone and once left the house in the middle of the night without telling anyone. I hiked onto a ridge with two dogs; my parents live in a rather remote area, about 20 minutes away from even a gas station.

I had a great time just staring at the stars on top of the mountain, and you could see for 50-70 miles all the lights on the other side of the ridge. I hiked down the mountain and just as I should have been getting back on the road toward home I noticed I could still see lights. I had taken the wrong trail, and was headed down the other side of the mountain.

About that time I heard a strange noise, like a deer in pain. It stopped rather suddenly and then I heard a hellacious, scary deep-throated mewling. The mewling continued as I picked up a large stick and humped it back to the ridge, where there was (at the time) an old apple orchard co-op building where 30-60 years before, people would make cider and process the apples.

I holed up in there with a brick, glass bottle, and the big stick until one of my dogs got in the building with me, then waited and waited...the noise got very close then stopped. I waited some more and, trembling, made my way home. Total hike was probably about seven miles.

I really learned a lesson that night. My parents realized I had left, but my mom heard the house creak and thought I was home. This was about 90 min before I really got home! I could have gotten mauled and no one would have known until the morning, and even then wouldn't have known where to look.

I definitely think big (and this thing sounded VERY big...I have heard bob cats and plenty of other animals, this wasn't something small) cats exist and should be watched for.

 

[conw]

I should also add that the dog, while obviously spooked, was very protective. This dog wouldn't have behaved that way over, say, a bobcat. I maintain that I was probably being stalked...I think the thing got within 80 yards of me.

 

[bigdee]

Looks a lot like he just crawled from a coal mine. Might be going on a wildcat strike.I have heard tales from people in east Tennessee about panters but they never offered pictures, nice post.

 

[bigdee]

All joking aside some people i know keep puma's as pets. It's not impossable that the subject of the picture could have been or is some big cat lovers pet or former pet.A ninty pound cat makes a "GREAT" guard dog.

 

[351 WINCHESTER]

I've told my kids and their friends that there are things in the woods that will kill and eat you. I've lived in Fl for over 50 years and have seen at least 3 cougars (one was very dark brown).

 

[savetheclaypigeons]

 

[wheelgunslinger]

conwict, you probably had that cat right on your six.

When I spend time in the rockies, I used to enjoy going out to watch the stars and such. still do. But, most of the time, I can backtrack where I or someone else walked and see Cougar tracks where it was following.

Cougars are deadly silent here in the east with all the ground cover to mask their footfalls, and tracks are pretty hard to see too. The only tracks I've ever seen were at watering holes. This makes them hard to spot and harder to photograph. Though, if you suspect one is around, you can employ game cameras to photograph the subject.

 

[Redfactor]

I'm surprised nobody else has proposed this explanation yet:

It could very well be an escaped exotic pet.

Exotic cat pets are quite popular and easy to obtain in the U.S. assuming you have the thousands of dollars they cost. I wouldn't be surprised if the owner just refuses to go to the authorities because the pets are against local laws. The fines / penalties that are sure to be slapped on the owner if caught could prevent him/her from alerting authorities of the situation.

If you realize just how many exotic big cats are kept as private pets in the U.S., then you'd be a fool to rule it out without some thought.

Check this out: http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2002/08/0816_020816_EXPLcats.html

 

[B.D. Turner]

There are all kinds of big cat stories around the Wilmington NC area. In 1953-1954 there was a beast killing livestock in Bladen County NC that could crush the skulls of a calf. People from all over the country came to track this unknown animal but it was never found.

 

[elrod]

They exist in the remote river swamps of central Alabama. I saw one over 40 years ago. Had a witness with me, never said much to anyone out of my circle of friends, what with the naysayers and all..........

 

[RNB65]

Wampus cat.

 

[AL9426]

Shes probobbly right, I go to Irvine, Kentucky every summer and I've seen one twice. The first time we saw one running across my grandfathers tobacco field and the second time was when we were fishing on Station Camp Creek and we saw it running away from the banks toward the woods.

 

[Art Eatman]

Ain't no always, but generally: A cougar's kill style is to attack from behind, knock the prey off balance and try for the throat. The teeth can penetrate the jugular and aorta; the grip can crush the windpipe.

Human beings, having short necks, commonly have wounds to the face and/or head.

 

[coorsdrifter]

People have been 'seeing' panthers in Ky for decades.

 

[Redfactor]

I'm looking for some clarification please - when y'all say 'panthers' you're referring to cougars/mountain lions/pumas, right? I think it's a regional thing.

... silly easterners ... it's the pop vs. soda debate all over again

 

[che_70b]

Probably so Redfactor. Keep in mind that here in the south east we are not suppose to have either cougar or panthers. When people see big black cats the first thing they think of is Panthers. I do find it interesting that in areas where there are not suppose to be big cats like this there are far more sightings of black cats than more common color variants.

 

[Double Naught Spy]

When people see big black cats the first thing they think of is Panthers. I do find it interesting that in areas where there are not suppose to be big cats like this there are far more sightings of black cats than more common color variants.

Yes, imagine that, the one cat they tend to see most is the rarest variety. I wonder why.

Of course, they see a lot of Bigfoot as well.

 

[Art Eatman]

All those names refer to the same animal. Yeah, it's pretty much a regional thing and is thus pretty much unimportant. Panther seems to be moe of an eastern usage. Cougar seems more common in the Rockies and the Northwest. Puma seems to be more of a literary usage. Generally, in Texas, it's mountain lion, and locally in my area it's jus lion.

No big deal...

The biologists say that the Florida panther is a sub-species, but even so it can interbreed with panthers from other parts of the country. Since the numbers are low in Florida and there is concern for inbreeding and continued viability of the species, some cross-breeding programs have been instituted there. (To be snarky, Florida panthers must not be real smart. Many have been killed by cars.)

 

[SlipperyShooter]

Here Kitty Kitty

My vote is for "poor picture of a distant black house cat."

Posture looks like a small domestic not a wild predator...........

 

[Vern Humphrey]

All my life I've heard people claim there are "panthers" or mountian lions in the Ozarks, and didn't really believe it. A few years back, one was killed inside the city limits in North Little Rock> The Arkansas Fish and Game explanation is, "It's someone's pet that escaped."

Now, if they admitted it was a wild mountain lion, the Endangered Species Act would require then to take all sorts of expensive and undesirable actions -- so they maintain that position, whether it is right or wrong.

Then about a month or so ago, as I was heading out at dusk to pick up a load of hay, and animal darted across the county road, full in the beams of my headlights. It was about the size of a deer, with about the same gray coloration -- but it was a cat with a looooong tail.

You tell me what it was.

 

[coelacanth]

Fwiw. . . . .

MY whole family is from Kentucky. Have been for generations. Farmers mostly with a few ner-do-wells, adventurers and crackpots thrown in for good measure. My great, great, great grandfather was married in the settlement of Yellowbanks (now known as Owensboro) on the Ohio river in 1804. His family settled about ten miles south of there on a major tributary of the Ohio which came to be known as Panther Creek. The surrounding wetlands came to be known as the Panther Creek bottoms. My great grandparents were still losing livestock to the cats in the late 1800's. The numbers decreased over time as the country became more populated but there were still occasional incidents of predation in my grandparents time and it was common to see the tracks and hear the occasional coughing snarl of the panther on a trip across the bottoms to visit neighbors or relatives. In the 1930's the CCC and the WPA undertook an ambitious drainage project through that part of the country which dried up a fair portion of the bottoms and yielded a lot of good farmland. This about finished off the local cats except for a rare sighting. However many of them remained were wary as hell and I never saw more than a blur of motion at the edge of my vision but the track confirmed what it was as surely as my track confirmed my existence. The only incidents regarding humans took place on two occasions I can remember clearly. A neighbor had a pretty good pack of 'coon dogs and they loved to run 'coons in the bottoms after dark so he and a couple of hunting buddies waited for the dogs to tree their quarry when it became clear that something was very bad wrong. They said the hounds' braying became a frantic howling mixed with yelps of pain and by the time they got to where the dogs were they could smell the blood.
Two dogs were down and dying and four more had wounds that took weeks to heal. Apparently they had treed the 'coon in the same tree the panther was in and he dropped down in the middle of that pack of dogs like a furry tornado. Another incident very similar to that occured two years later in 1962. I left that country in 1978 and moved to Arizona and have hunted, fished, hiked and gold panned all over this magnificent state. I had to wait until I was here to see my first mountain lion or "panther" as they are known in Kentucky. The same movement I had barely glimpsed in the thick woods of Panther Creek bottoms was clearly displayed in the open country here. The tracks were the same in damp ground. Are there still panthers in the wild parts of Kentucky? I wouldn't bet against it.

 

[paintballdude902]

myles im a ways away from u my brother in law shot one 2 years ago but fish and game said it must have been an escaped pet

 

[Vern Humphrey]

My position is I'd shoot it and then have it stuffed. If Fish and Game made any noise, I'd point out it must be someone's escaped pet -- which is their official position -- and I'm holding the critter for the owners to claim. If they can positively identify it and after they pay me for the damage it did to my livestock.

Until then, it stays in my living room.