interesting sighting(long)

PariahPoet · Post by **PariahPoet** » Sat Mar 15, 2008 12:30 am

I recently quit my coffeehouse job to take a position as a substance abuse counselor which will begin on Monday. Because of this gap in employment, I have had some free time on my hands.
I live in a quiet community set back in the woods in the Big Thicket of southeast Texas, so we get a lot of wildlife. I have seen foxes, deer, rabbits, even a bobcat out here.

This morning around 10am I was washing dishes when I looked out the window and saw a large animal in the woods across the creek. I thought at first glance that it was a neighbor's black lab that hangs around sometimes, but when I looked again, it was stalking quietly like a cat and it moved enough that I also saw it had a long feline tail. So whatever this was, it was definitely a cat of some kind. The odd thing was its size and color. It looked to be about the size of a medium to large dog. But there are no cats in my area that are large and black. Here in the big thicket, resident felids include housecats(too small), jaguarundi(different body shape, and it is uncertain if they have a completely black color phase), bobcats(they do have a melanistic phase, but still no good because this thing had a long tail), ocelots(very rare, but still listed as an endangered resident species), and cougars(which have no melanistic phase at all).
The animal I saw was large, completely black, heavy-bodied like it was relatively muscular, and had a long tail.

That leaves a few options-
First possiblility- it could have been a melanistic ocelot. Would have been a very rare sighting, but not out of the question.
Second possibility- could have been some kind of hybrid. Bobcat/housecat crosses are not uncommon in this area, and that could possibly result in a large, all-black animal with a long tail.
Third option- It could have been a black jaguar. There have been precious few reports of a jaguar wandering this far north in search of prey. However, this is so highly unlikely it's hardly worth mentioning.
Fourth option- It could possibly have been a cougar/jaguarundi hybrid. Neither cat can cross with a domestic cat, but genetically, cougars and 'rundis are very closely related, so they might be able to crross-breed to produce all-black offspring.

I did, however, rule out the possibility that it was just a housecat. I knew immediately when I saw it that it was a large cat, but later in the day I started doubting myself because it seemed so unlikely even in these wild woods. While I was thinking about this, peering hopefully through the window, a deer sprinted flat-out down the same game trail the cat had taken, only heading in the opposite direction. Not only did this give me reason to believe that a large predator had spooked it, but it gave me a scale to work with. The cat I saw was about halfway to the deer's shoulder. My cat also wandered out there a few hours later, and she looked tiny at that distance. It was definitely much bigger than her. (then, thinking about a large predator out there, I got her and put her in the house)

I also went out there where it was to look for pawprints, but it was walking in the leaves, so it was difficult to find any evidence of its presence. I did find some prints in a small stream feeding into the creek that I think may have belonged to the animal, but the mud was so covered in dead leaves it was hard to tell because they were just indentions.

I got some pictures of the possible prints, and a picture of my kitty in the area where I saw it. I am going to try to sketch the animal to scale in the picture as well as memory serves.

PariahPoet · Post by **PariahPoet** » Sat Mar 15, 2008 12:32 am

Can we please move "general" to the non-were related category? This story has nothing to do with weres, but the only place to put it is under "The ultimate werewolf"

PariahPoet · Post by **PariahPoet** » Sat Mar 15, 2008 1:59 am

Ok, here's a sketch of it in the trees where I saw it with my cat to scale.This is an aproximation on scale. It may have been a bit smaller, but not much.

Here are the prints I found(outlined in blue and with a quarter for scale)

And this is just a pretty flower I found out there-

Teh_DarkJokerWolf · Post by **Teh_DarkJokerWolf** » Sat Mar 15, 2008 2:05 am

hmm...is there known to be big cats in ur area? I know alot of places are like this with areas that have animals living there that aren't native to it.

PariahPoet · Post by **PariahPoet** » Sat Mar 15, 2008 9:33 am

No big cats that would be black.
Right now I think the best possibility would be some kind of hybrid between a bobcat and a very large housecat, or a melanistic ocelot.
Cougars don't have the genetic variation that allows for a solid black coat, and I don't think it was quite big enough to be an adult cougar. It could have been a 'rundi possibly, but it seemed too tall and too muscular. Unless maybe it was a big burly tom. Even then, rundis tend to have a gray or red face even when the rest of their coat is black.

outwarddoodles · Post by **outwarddoodles** » Sat Mar 15, 2008 5:40 pm

The first animal that comes to mind for me is a Jagaur -- the spots on a black jagaur would be too difficult to see from your distance. Of course, even though Jagaurs are native to South America, Texas just seems to be a bit too far up north for one.

If you're really intent on figuring out what sort of creature was roaming in your woods, I'd recommending sending an e-mail to the wildlife service around you and asking about it.

RedEye · Post by **RedEye** » Sat Mar 15, 2008 9:59 pm

The pug marks look feline, but what is the size of the shiny metal thing in the center of the picture?
Going by the size of the grasses and leaves I can recognize, the tracks look to be about an inch and a half to an inch and three quarters across; about right for a big cat of forty-five to sixty pounds weight.

:hint...when taking pictures of tracks or other disturbances, try to put something like a business card or a quarter down beside the track: that gives a repeatable size/scale to the markings and makes it easier to see just how big things are. The reason I suggest a quarter is that it is 15/16ths of an inch (might as well be an inch) across, and almost everybody has one or two.

Set · Post by **Set** » Sat Mar 15, 2008 10:11 pm

I was thinking weasel at first. (You thought it was a dog, then saw its tail and said cat.) Though what you're describing might be a bit too big for that.

Lukas · Post by **Lukas** » Sat Mar 15, 2008 10:52 pm

PariahPoet wrote:Can we please move "general" to the non-were related category? This story has nothing to do with weres, but the only place to put it is under "The ultimate werewolf"

the non-were general section no longer exists, it seems to have been merged with the were general section

PariahPoet · Post by **PariahPoet** » Sat Mar 15, 2008 11:04 pm

RedEye wrote:The pug marks look feline, but what is the size of the shiny metal thing in the center of the picture?
Going by the size of the grasses and leaves I can recognize, the tracks look to be about an inch and a half to an inch and three quarters across; about right for a big cat of forty-five to sixty pounds weight.

:hint...when taking pictures of tracks or other disturbances, try to put something like a business card or a quarter down beside the track: that gives a repeatable size/scale to the markings and makes it easier to see just how big things are. The reason I suggest a quarter is that it is 15/16ths of an inch (might as well be an inch) across, and almost everybody has one or two.

"shiny metal thing" is a quarter.

PariahPoet · Post by **PariahPoet** » Sat Mar 15, 2008 11:06 pm

Lukas wrote:
PariahPoet wrote:Can we please move "general" to the non-were related category? This story has nothing to do with weres, but the only place to put it is under "The ultimate werewolf"
the non-were general section no longer exists, it seems to have been merged with the were general section

That's my point. This general thread is located under "the ultimate werewolf"
But a general category is not used for werewolf related topics.

PariahPoet · Post by **PariahPoet** » Sat Mar 15, 2008 11:09 pm

Set wrote:I was thinking weasel at first. (You thought it was a dog, then saw its tail and said cat.) Though what you're describing might be a bit too big for that.

Way, way too big for a weasel. It looked to be about three times the size of my cat.
The best possibility is one of my kinfolk, it just seemed a bit too muscular for a 'rundi.

MoonKit · Post by **MoonKit** » Sun Mar 16, 2008 3:35 pm

My favorite part of this thread was the "and here's a random flower" picture.

RedEye · Post by **RedEye** » Sun Mar 16, 2008 9:19 pm

PariahPoet wrote:
RedEye wrote:The pug marks look feline, but what is the size of the shiny metal thing in the center of the picture?
Going by the size of the grasses and leaves I can recognize, the tracks look to be about an inch and a half to an inch and three quarters across; about right for a big cat of forty-five to sixty pounds weight.

:hint...when taking pictures of tracks or other disturbances, try to put something like a business card or a quarter down beside the track: that gives a repeatable size/scale to the markings and makes it easier to see just how big things are. The reason I suggest a quarter is that it is 15/16ths of an inch (might as well be an inch) across, and almost everybody has one or two.
"shiny metal thing" is a quarter.

Sorry; the laptop's resolution leaves somethng to be desired, sometimes. Now that I'm on my desktop, I can see that. That makes the marks a little larger than before, but I'm still sticking with my size estimate; cat paws are more "squishy" than dog prints and make larger marks on the ground. Have there been any reports of pets disappearing in your area? Pets are often the food of choice for such carnivores. And no, those aren't Puma pugs (paw markings); Pumas leave prints that are at least a half inch larger ( they are the biggest felines in the Americas) and are more "squared" in shape than these marks.
I think you are right about it being a Jag; it's the only native cat other than the Puma that gets that large and has a serpentine tail.

PariahPoet · Post by **PariahPoet** » Sun Mar 16, 2008 9:45 pm

Well, I went back out today in search of more prints and found one more that is a bit better quality. I'm making a cast of it. It's definitely feline(no claws like a canine and the toes are more spred out like a cat. Quality still isn't great, but the sive of this print is about right for a bobcat or a 'rundi.

Scott Gardener · Post by **Scott Gardener** » Wed Mar 19, 2008 2:32 pm

Quite an impressive visitation. Given your own predilection and thus your knowledge base about felines, you're probably among the most qualified among us to theorize as to what it was.

If it's still in the area, perhaps you can bait it with food for additional paw prints, or perhaps even a photograph--though the latter could require days or weeks, making it not likely or practical, I suppose.