There is a large predatory cat loose in Conway, Arkansas today, possibly a panther.
Officers have confirmed the sighting but not the exact species.
They occasionally get bear coming into Conway, walking up the train tracks, but I’ve not heard of any cat larger than a lynx before.
–James
Yikezahooti. I wonder if this is going to be one of those exotic pet things. You know what we need in this country? Large predatory cat control.
Humbug! Large predatory cats are part of the solution, not the problem! They’ll help reduce the surplus population of housecats, dogs, unsupervised children, and coyotes. 
They’ll probabaly kill it, like that one in Chicago, SOBs. I can’t believe nobody has a dart gun and knows how to use it. I would have personally flown to Chicago for that cat, it’s only an hour and a half to O’hare, SOBs. Tear Down the Border Fence! Jaguars For eveyone!
If it’s not an escape, this is exciting info. It’s only in the past year or so that the presence of a cougar east of the rockies was finally proven by DNA-tested scat from Ontario. Ere now, there had been a substantial body of unconfirmed sightings but nothing, err, solid. So to speak.
Um, not exactly true here in the States. There is the Florida population, as a kitten I raised that was seized in AZ will attest to, and there are an untold number of sightings in many eastern states that have been substantiated by scat analysis.
The story doesn’t really give an indication that the sighting is “confirmed” in any real sense, so I’m skeptical. I’ve been out with people who’ve mistaken bears, bobcats, dogs, coyotes, and even deer for a supposed “mountain lion” when hiking in an area where warning signs are posted (seems to prime people for seeing the things, or thinking they see them!). This could just be somebody’s black lab that was spotted by an . . . excitable Arkansan.
If it’s a real sighting, it’s almost certainly an escaped exotic, since there’s never been a documented case of a black (melanistic) mountain lion/puma/cougar/whatever your local name for our biggest cat is (now that jaguars are probably extinct in the States). It’d be a leopard or a jaguar, and someone’ll be (or should be) in trouble for letting the thing out. Or it’d be even more amazing than s1m0n notes, confirming the existence of at least two things that were thought not to be around (big cats in Arkansas, and that come in fashionable black, to boot).
Is moonshine still a thriving concern in Conway, by any chance, James?
You’re telling us you think sedation darts work instantly (just like in the movies)
and should be standard issue for the Chicago Police?
They were trapping for one down in Chicago’s southside China town a couple years earlier. All they ever got were the huge foot prints in the snow.
That’s interesting. I hadn’t realized how much had changed in the past few years.
http://www.easterncougar.org/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eastern_Cougar
Well, I can’t speak for Chicago, but I believe that they routinely tranquilize the bears that wander into Conway and relocate them to the Ouachita National Forest, along with other assorted wildlife that wanders into town.
–James
I know exactly how a dart works as I am certified for multiple delivery systems including dart guns, in fact I think my first gun came from a guy in Arkansas, which I have used more times than I can count. And with the Brookfield right there in the city I can’t believe there wouldn’t have been someone there who couldn’t have tried if they had been contacted. Do you know if anyone in the CPD contacted them about a possible cougar in the city? My real life experience with this type of situation leads me to believe they did not.
We have all sorts of cougars here. I can’t believe they aren’t at least as common in the eastern US, as well. Just come downtown with me on a Saturday night …
djm
I wouldn’t be surprised if you do have a cougar. Y’all have mountains and isolated places I would think, kinda like around here. I have heard one and seen two -and no they were NOT bobcats, I’ve seen enough bob cats to know them. Heck, we’ve got so many whitetailed deer around here that they could easily live off the fat of the land and never get around people.
Well, there are many credible witnesses who report large predatory cats in Arkansas.
Unfortunately, the fella who who reported the “panther” yesterday wasn’t one of them.
It’s been identified as a large housecat. Efforts are underway to catch it but it keeps stealing the bait from the traps without tripping the traps.
Sounds like it’s just as well it wasn’t a panther, huh?
–James
Well shucks! I was hoping maybe it was a jaguarundi. I got one outside Brownsville TX in April '80. It could easily be mistaken for a melanistic cat and small enough to travel far undetected.