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Black Cougar sighting in Schuylkill County Pennsylvania
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In August, as I was driving back home from a friends house on a rural road in east- central PA, I had a sighting of what I could only describe as a
black cougar.
I was driving rather slowly as there had been storms earlier and being well familiar with this rather twisty road, I knew there would be branches down from the trees that overhung the road. Plus it was rather late at night (between 1:00 and 1:30 a.m.) and it's always likely you'll find deer or other wildlife on that road.
As I was negotiating a right hand turn, my high beams lit up a decent sized part of a field of weeds that ran alongside this stretch. That's when I noticed the black cat loping through the weeds. The sighting itself lasted only 3 or 4 seconds long, but I had a very good frontal view of this animal.
I'd estimate that it was about 4 - 4.5 feet long not counting the tail, and maybe 3 feet tall. The weeds there were maybe 2.5 feet tall at the time, tall enough that any regular domestic house cat would be swallowed up by the surrounding vegetation, so I feel I can safely rule that out.
At he time I first noticed it I'd say it was about 20 feet from the edge of the road and moving at a good ground eating pace, though I would not say the thing was running in earnest (such as running away from something it feared, or towards something it was chasing). And then I was by it, and I lost sight of it due to darkness.
At this point I did decide to turn around and try and go back (the first opportunity to do this was maybe 1/8 of a mile further on) and catch another glimpse even knowing that it'd likely be futile. It was. I didn't catch any sign of it driving slowly back up the road. So I turned around again and continued home.
Two odd things that stood out for me. The cat was not entirely black but had a small triangular shaped white blaze on it's chest. The other odd thing to me was that it never reacted to my passing by it in any discernible way. It never slowed, never varied direction, never oriented it's head in my direction. Nothing.
If anybody has seen anything similar, especially in this part of the country, where wildlife/game experts will tell you cougars (let alone black ones) are supposed to have been gone for a hundred years or more, I'd welcome your thoughts.
And before anyone says it, no I was not high, drunk or anything else at the time. Peace.
[edit on 17-10-2008 by Resinveins]
I was driving rather slowly as there had been storms earlier and being well familiar with this rather twisty road, I knew there would be branches down from the trees that overhung the road. Plus it was rather late at night (between 1:00 and 1:30 a.m.) and it's always likely you'll find deer or other wildlife on that road.
As I was negotiating a right hand turn, my high beams lit up a decent sized part of a field of weeds that ran alongside this stretch. That's when I noticed the black cat loping through the weeds. The sighting itself lasted only 3 or 4 seconds long, but I had a very good frontal view of this animal.
I'd estimate that it was about 4 - 4.5 feet long not counting the tail, and maybe 3 feet tall. The weeds there were maybe 2.5 feet tall at the time, tall enough that any regular domestic house cat would be swallowed up by the surrounding vegetation, so I feel I can safely rule that out.
At he time I first noticed it I'd say it was about 20 feet from the edge of the road and moving at a good ground eating pace, though I would not say the thing was running in earnest (such as running away from something it feared, or towards something it was chasing). And then I was by it, and I lost sight of it due to darkness.
At this point I did decide to turn around and try and go back (the first opportunity to do this was maybe 1/8 of a mile further on) and catch another glimpse even knowing that it'd likely be futile. It was. I didn't catch any sign of it driving slowly back up the road. So I turned around again and continued home.
Two odd things that stood out for me. The cat was not entirely black but had a small triangular shaped white blaze on it's chest. The other odd thing to me was that it never reacted to my passing by it in any discernible way. It never slowed, never varied direction, never oriented it's head in my direction. Nothing.
If anybody has seen anything similar, especially in this part of the country, where wildlife/game experts will tell you cougars (let alone black ones) are supposed to have been gone for a hundred years or more, I'd welcome your thoughts.
And before anyone says it, no I was not high, drunk or anything else at the time. Peace.
[edit on 17-10-2008 by Resinveins]
I live in the Pennsylvania area. I remember there was a scare about 10 years ago of big cats. It was basically fact they were out there from the
amount of picture evidence. I mean these were fairly clean shots. As I recall there were a couple large cougars but I am not sure if they were ever
caught. Quite a few people had eyewitness accounts.
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