East Texas Mountain Lion or Black Panther Sightings/ Killings

[ducks-and-bucks]

^^^^^^^^^ edit your post into english please!

[robbyreneeward]

Four years ago during the spring of 2009, my wife and mother-in-law were walking from her field back to camp which is about a 200 yd walk. Halfway back they heard one roar and said every hair they had on their body stood on end. Needless to say they picked up the pace and got back to the truck pretty quickly. Also, last fall, just a few miles from Rivercrest high school in the southern part of our county, a 140 inch Tenpoint was found mauled With deep scratch marks beginning in its rib cage and ending and it's hindquarters. The game warden was at a football game on Friday night and got the call to come investigate. I talked to him at my work about a week later and he confirmed to me that yes, while no one saw a big cat kill the animal, the evidence on the carcass Definitely pointed toward a big cat. The words "yes the deer was killed by a Mountain lion" came out of his mouth. This is in Northeast Texas. So yes, I believe mountain lions do exist in this part of the state, but not sure about their coloration.

[jay07ag]

Joogers neighbor in Huntington sees them nearly every day, just ask Jooger....granted the guy goes through a case of Jim Beam in about a week.

Gotta think there are one or two melanistic gato grandes out there somewhere, but until I see one with its ****** in the dirt, I will be hesitant to believe all of the "sightings"

[muzzlebrake]

I have seen one mountain lion in Crane Co when I was a kid. My parents and I were on a Sunday drive out between Crane and McCamey going to King Mountain and Castle Gap and one ran across and down the oil road in front of us in broad daylight.
I used to coon hunt with my Dad a lot and twice we have seen Jaguarundis in the woods. Yep, up close and personal as the dogs had em treed. Both times they were up a Bois D'arc tree. The first Jag we treed was on the LBJ Grassland right near Twin Lakes. Second was on Caney Creek north of Bonham about 1/2 mile from the river. These cats are not all that big but definitely bigger than a house cat, more like the size of a good Bobcat and they do appear black.
Stupid cats jumped right out on top of them 2 redbones. Yeah we got a real close look.
As for black panthers, I still with Uncle Si on that.

[ezypikns]

From a TPWD Publication.....

Mountain lions are native to Texas and classified as non-game species. They occur in the Trans Pecos in primarily large undeveloped tracts of land. TPWD has records of mountain lions occurring in every county of Texas except for the northernmost counties of the Panhandle. Presently Texas regulations allow for the management of lion populations and lions may be controlled year-round. Other states have become more restrictive in their regulations, making it difficult to manage expanding predator populations and an increase in human injury has occurred.

My guess is that anywhere you have a decent deer population they'll be there.


a black lion seems unlikely, though.

[robbyreneeward]

My guess is that anywhere you have a decent deer population they'll be there.


a black lion seems unlikely, though.

So if you see a mountain lion in the wild, you can take a shot? I was under the understanding that they were protected by the state and were to be left alone.

[BowSlayer]

My guess is that anywhere you have a decent deer population they'll be there.


a black lion seems unlikely, though.

I called the GW a few years ago after I saw one on my lease. He said it was not uncommon to see them around here any more and said I could shoot them if I wanted to. He also added "there's really no reason to shoot them". So, legally you can shoot them but he didn't want me to is what I gathered.

[Kuller]

So would you guys advocate killing one of these obvious rare black panthers in order to prove all of the naysayers wrong? I know a picture would not do....it would just be torn apart.

[ptcase86]

I hunt near Crockett and in the past 5 years we have had 2 Big cat incidents. The first was about 5 years ago When a guy on our neighboring lease had shot a doe during bow season and waited about and hour then went to tracking when he finaly found the doe it had been drug 100+yards and had large teeth marks around its head, claw marks over its body and the hind quarters eaten out of it and large cat prints around the body.
The second time happened last year one of the guys was driving into town after the morning hunt and less than half a mile from the camp a large black cat with about a 4-6 foot long tail rain out in front of his truck stopped and looked at him then ran back into the woods.
So i do believe we do have black panthers and or mountain lions in our area.

[duck or bleed]

I heard one while coon huntin one night and it was definitely black! I heard it with my own ears!. I don't believe in black panthers but I know what I heard! I wish I would have had a tape recorder with me!

[kfd82]

I'm always amazed that 4 out of 5 people who have seen a Black Panther have never seen a regular Mt Lion...

[perfectstorm]

My friend who bow hunts in Liberty Co now carries a pistol on her hip after a run in with a tan colored mountain lion. She only had her bow on her while walking to her stand & she said in the heat of the moment, if they see you first, there is no chance to get your bow & arrow ready. But she sure tried-- in all the chaos the mountain lion ran away. She said it didn't look like it wanted to attack her but she didn't see any cubs or anything either. She's a country girl who knows her animals, so I highly doubt it was anything but what she said. And she had not been drinking. Her younger son was hunting close but did not run into it (Thank God).

[Bowhunter004]

Double post

[Bowhunter004]

I've never laid eyes on one personally but when I hunted in Grapeland we had tons of hogs in the melon fields so we shot a few and left em lay in a costal field. The next day we went to see if anything had eaten on them. We couldn't find any of them, we got to looking around and noticed that they were all in tall grass and something had covered them up with grass and sticks. I told the GW about it and he said it was defiantly a cougar/mountain lion.

[snappertapper]

I told the GW about it and he said it was defiantly a cougar/mountain lion.

you realize those are the same thing right?