What do you call this cat?

[MS 9x56]

According to the Missouri Game Department no melanistic mountain lion has ever been found in North or South America.

I went to college to be a wildlife biologist, but I don't currently work in that profession. I never read anything about melanistic or luscitic mountain lions in my entire life. I often read big game ecology papers, and other white papers on big cats. I am no authority on big cats, but I doubt it was a mountain lion either. There are a ton of exotic big cats in the USA. Something like 15,000 under fence, could have been a variety of other things as melanistic versions of leopards and jaguars do exist.

I believe your sighting, and I wonder what it really was.

I am not a biologist but this was a large cat around 100 pounds I would estimate about 5-6 feet long with a 3 foot long tail. It was black and the paw prints in the dust along the road were about 6 inches across. My wife is an avid bird watcher so we have many bird feeders in our yard. As a result I get to observe 3-6 bears every year. I am quite familiar with what a bear looks like. This was not a bear. Back on topic I would enjoy a mountain lion hunt with hounds. Not sure I would kill it but if I did I would have to eat it.

 

[Firebird]

Six inches would be an enormous cat! Fun to take pix of big cats in trees and thenLet them go. The meat is white and bland, was best cooked into something such as fajitas. Next one I kill will just be turned into jerky. . .

 

[Longwalker]

There's terrible shortage of mountains where I live in Saskatchewan, but in recent years there have been a few cougars seen.