BLACK PANTHERS IN AMERICA

There seems to be a plenitude of Black panthers turning up where no such creatures should be.  In the United States, it has been sometimes said they are Black Pumas, but such creatures are rarely - and I mean very rarely - to be found in the zoological record.

However, the Native Americans had traditions of a black felid distinct from the puma and this seems to have gone largely unnoticed by cryptozoologists.  Small populations of these may have survived and possibly the population has begun to expand, accounting for some of the sightings.

One of these was the Devil Cat, which had a reputation for carrying off children.  Then, in British Columbia, there was the How How.  It has been found in totem poles, but the Indians maintain it once existed and differed from the puma.

Adding to the mixture, jaguarundis are sometimes black and probably big enough to be mistaken for a Phantom Black Panther.

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