The truth about black pumas

[Still Waters]

In all the time that I have been researching and documenting creatures of cryptozoology (almost 30 years now!), I have encountered few subjects engendering more controversy and confusion than the reality, or otherwise, of black pumas. Consequently, I have explored various aspects of this most contentious mystery cat in a number of different publications of mine. Yet as the subject still incites heated debate even today, I feel that it is now time to assemble together my disparate writings concerning it, and present them here.

The two most commonly-voiced identities for Britain’s elusive ebony-furred mystery cats, as well as those reported in continental Europe, North America, and Australia, are escapee/released black panthers (i.e. melanistic, all-black specimens of the leopard Panthera pardus) and black (melanistic) pumas. Yet whereas the former is plausible, the latter is little short of impossible - for two extremely good, fundamental reasons.

http://karlshuker.bl...separating.html

[pallidin]

I actually thought you wrote the article until I read more into the link!

[CRIPTIC CHAMELEON]

I have come across some plain old ferral cats and they are as big as a medium dog [bordercollie] but I have as yet to see a puma, I have seen some very large prints around a friends house before.

[Abramelin]

In all the time that I have been researching and documenting creatures of cryptozoology (almost 30 years now!), I have encountered few subjects engendering more controversy and confusion than the reality, or otherwise, of black pumas. Consequently, I have explored various aspects of this most contentious mystery cat in a number of different publications of mine. Yet as the subject still incites heated debate even today, I feel that it is now time to assemble together my disparate writings concerning it, and present them here.

The two most commonly-voiced identities for Britain’s elusive ebony-furred mystery cats, as well as those reported in continental Europe, North America, and Australia, are escapee/released black panthers (i.e. melanistic, all-black specimens of the leopard Panthera pardus) and black (melanistic) pumas. Yet whereas the former is plausible, the latter is little short of impossible - for two extremely good, fundamental reasons.

http://karlshuker.bl...separating.html

Here's an old post of mine:

Here's a link about hybrid cats:

http://members.aol.com/jshartwell/hybrid-bigcats.html

I was interested in this thread, because some 14 years ago I was roaming around in the jungles north-east of Iquitos, Peru, and heard a story about a black jaguar-puma hybrid.

I learned about this story back then when I was talking with a local guide about recent attacks on pigs , cows and people by some big black cat. I asked the guide if it could have been a black jaguar, but he told me this cat was a lot bigger. The only other big cat that's roaming the jungles of north-eastern Peru is the puma. But when I asked the guide about the possibility it could have been a puma, he again said no, because the cat the locals had seen was much more muscular than a lean puma.

I kept asking and asking, and then I got a hunch: I asked the guide: "Does anyone here keep jaguars and pumas in a cage?" The guide immediately knew where I was going to with my question, and said something like: "O my god, you mean it is some kind of escaped crossbred??" He said he had been thinking all along that it must have been a crossbred between a jaguar and a puma, because the first attacks started in the neighbourhood of the guy he kept both species of cats in one large cage somewhere . Although he kept the cats in separate cages, the cages were in fact created by dividing a large cage in two compartments with wood and bamboo and when the guide, years earlier, visited the guy who kept the cats, he noticed that the dividing wall was a bit crappy and could be torn apart by a strong man. The owner of the cats said not to worry if the wall wasn't that well build, for the jaguar and the puma were very friendly to each other, one being a male, the other a female…..

Although it has nothing to do with the topic of big hybrid cats, this guide, with whom I was able to speak because he was in command of some English (he was a native who had lived for a year in N-America, but went back to his native country because he was terribly homesick), also told me a rather weird story.

It started when I asked him if he had ever come across an anaconda. He then told me that several years before he had been hunting tapir with some of the men of the village he lived in on the border of the jungle. After walking some hours through the thick and dark undergrowth they came upon a sunlit clearing in the forest and seated themselves on a fallen tree trunk to have a break. After half an hour or so they went on to continue their hunt. When they had finally managed to capture and kill a large tapir they returned to that same clearing to have a pause before going home. They wanted to sit together on that same trunk they sat on hours before, but the trunk was gone! They noticed that from the place the trunk had been lying on the forest floor there was a wide and slowly meandering trail of flattened grass and undergrowth that disappeared into the dark forest. The meandering trail had been at least two to three feet wide………

[Thegreatsilence]

Very nice read. This giant black panther can't be a hybrid though IMO : Pumapards (puma/leopard) tend be smaller than their respective congenitors, so I don't see how it could be different for Puma/Jaguar hybrids.

[Hugo Stiglitz]

What do you call this?

[Thegreatsilence]

I call this a pseudo-melanistic jaguar.

[DKO]

What do you call this?

Possibly a Leguar, if the photo is real.

http://en.wikipedia....Panthera_hybrid

Edit to add: Or most likely just a pseudo-melanistic panther like Thegreatsilence said.

Edited October 1, 2012 by DKO