Comments on: More Black Panthers Terrorizing Texas?

By: shartexas

shartexas — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 08:05:10 +0000

It’s goofy that “black panthers” are considered crypto creatures and not recognized by Texas Parks and Wildlife and other authorities. I think they must be fairly commonplace. My relatives recently sighted one on their Central Texas ranch, but didn’t report it to authorities. I’m sure this happens all the time. I myself have heard the terrifying “screaming woman” sound in the same county in which the black panther was seen, but I was told at the time that it was a bobcat.

By: laureno311

laureno311 — Mon, 09 Feb 2009 20:15:27 +0000

Its just killing me that this is not considered common place for these animals to live here. for over 100 yrs my family has lived in this area and these cats are a constant. My family have had two horses attacked by these cats. The first time I was very young and the last time a year and a half ago. If I had known I would have taken pictures. Both my grandmother and my sister have seen them and although I have not spotted one I have heard them scream plenty of times its like a banshee. I currently live off of hwy 154 near the Sabine river bottoms. I was more surprised to hear about the recent bear sightings than these cats. CRAZY!!! These cats are here they are real. I guess I need to start keeping a camera on the ready. Maybe I will catch something for yall.

By: akarafi

akarafi — Sat, 27 Dec 2008 05:31:17 +0000

I live in East Texas, VanZandt county, in Canton about one mile east of downtown.

I have seen two Black Panthers on my property, my neigbors saw them too and we all agree that they are Panthers, not cougar or anything else. they are Black Panthers.

one of my neighbors shot one, and there is one left in the area.

By: aloredojr

aloredojr — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 05:44:16 +0000

In 2002 my brother and i where in cleveland, texas when we caught sight (ablout 2/10 of a mile from us ) of a large black cat. We first thought it was odd for a house cat to be this far in the woods. When we drove up to the spot where we had seen the cat thats when we relized it was too big, judging by the distance and the brush it past, to be a regular cat. I estimated to stand about 2.5 to 3 feet tall at its shoulders. We never told anybody about it, we just blew it off.One day i was looking at tv when a show came on about big black cats and how there was no such thing. That is when i knew i had to had seen something unusal. So i agree that there is a possibility of something out there.

By: xaviergonz

xaviergonz — Thu, 13 Mar 2008 06:09:55 +0000

1997: We have a ranch in Ramirez, Texas where 3 of us saw a large black cat leap out a few feet from a buddy holding a jack rabbit he had just shot. It easily jumped over 8 feet back into the thicket after it saw the rest of us. Not sure if it was after the kill or not. I am a biologist with recorded jaguarundi sightings and twice published with my work. I know what we saw and it was in the clear for us to see especially my engineer buddy that was just a few feet from the large cat.

By: Archaic

Archaic — Thu, 13 Dec 2007 04:26:11 +0000

kf4yre: I live on the Texas/Arkansas border, and I totaly agree. Around here, panthers are just another part of the wildlife. They aren’t seen amazingly often, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t seen. They are so well known and factual to my whole town that to report a sighting or one would be like reporting a sighting of a coyote. Sure, if it is seen anywhere near where it could become a danger, then it is told to the Wildlife and Game wardens.

I have grown up with the knowledge of these panthers and their dieing woman-like screams. Their as real to me as couars are.

By: mystery_man

mystery_man — Wed, 04 Apr 2007 15:01:53 +0000

The odds being “extremely remote” do not mean “impossible”. I think there is a possibility a jaguar could have migrated up from down South, and black jaguars do exist, so that should not be completely ruled out yet. And as was said on the other post on this topic, there is a huge population of exotics kept in Texas that are not very well regulated it seems, so that possibility should remain open as well.

By: kf4yre

kf4yre — Tue, 03 Apr 2007 17:43:01 +0000

We used to have one on our farm but I havn’t seen it in years. The area where our farm is has been pretty much taken over by coyotes. I always thought that maybe they pushed it out. Or, it could have just migrated somewhere else on it’s own. My buddy and I was talking just last week about them, when I was back home on vacation. He’s still seeing one occasionally, so I reckon they’re still around.

By: kf4yre

kf4yre — Tue, 03 Apr 2007 17:32:19 +0000

It’s cool you have a copy of the report Rillo777. I’m not aware of them ever making the news back home, or of anybody ever killing one. They was so common place that they was thought of about like coyotes are, nobody really paid that much attention to them. Not sure if anybody ever knew what they were exactly. We just called them black panthers because of how they looked.

I do know that a buddy of mine has at least one around on his farm. He’s seen it chasing after deer on the farm. A couple years ago he got a deer while hunting and hung it up in a little shed next to his house. The next morning, something had gotten to the deer and tore it up. It was still hung up but it was tore up as if something had been eating on it. He said it had claw marks way up on the body. He said whatever did it must have been big to have leaned up and left marks so high up on the body. He figured it was the panther.

By: Rillo777

Rillo777 — Tue, 03 Apr 2007 16:39:57 +0000

kf4yre: I agree completely! You’re just south of me state-wise, but I’ve heard of them in Ohio and Illinois, too. The last big black cat that got attention from the media here was about 2000 or 2001 when it attacked a horse near a little tourist town called Zionsville. That’s about 30 miles or so west of me. Stories of black cats here go back over a hundred years. In the 1950’s someone, about 5 miles south of me, found a black kitten that belonged to one of the black cats. They said the mother’s “roar” sounded like a woman screaming. This is the only time I’ve ever heard of a possible capture of a BBC (big black cat).
This was all reported in the newspaper of which I have a photocopy. Of course, I have been unable to track down the family involved or whatever became of the kitten.
Incidently, according to the newspaper three veternarians and even a man from India who supposedly was familiar with panthers examined the kitten and could not determine the species.