Black Panther Sightings of Ohio

I start this article off with a personal story. My Grandmother use to tell me when I was a child that she saw a black panther on the Kentucky side of the Ohio River.  She was younger when she saw this, standing on the Ohio side of the river in Portsmouth, looking over to the Kentucky side, and saw in the forest, a very large black cat.  She called it a black panther.  When I was a kid, grandma use to have a large child's stuffed animal; a black panther that could purr.  I suppose she picked it up at a zoo.  She would show him off and then tell her story about seeing this large frightening cat.  I have no doubt that she really did see something. It had to be large to be see from across the river!  I think she only told it to me once or twice, but it left an impression on me.      

The Black Puma by Lizars. 1843

It wasn't until years later that I even looked into this kind of story and was shocked to find that reports of large black cats in North America are not uncommon.  As of this writing, I see a large list of sightings in my own state of Ohio, dating back over the last ten years.  Many authors have tackled these stories, namely, my introduction to the phenomenon, Loren Coleman and his book, Mysterious America. He devotes 2 chapters to mystery cats; The Phantom Panthers and Maned Mystery Cats chapters are quite eye opening, giving reports of these animals spanning the entire last century and more.  Briefly, maned lion like males and black panther like females are seen together in North America.    

In relation to my grandmothers sighting, the Eastern Puma Research Network  has a map of the hot spots of the eastern half of the US from 1935 to 2000.  The whole eastern half of the US is covered in yellow highlight, indicating where they are suppose to roam.   There, circled in blue is a large area covering Portsmouth, Ohio.  Blue on this map indicates; "Documented by DNA, trail cameras, tracks, dead cougars & cubs or field evidence of professional scientists with wildlife of forest biology backgrounds & experience..."


Though some call them black panthers, they could be any kind of large cat.  Leopard, jaguar, cougar, they all fall into this black cat pigmentation, or melanism.  What ever they are, in my future travels, I will keep my eyes open for these mystery cats.

For more mystery big cats, see Loren Coleman's Cryptomundo site.

- Mark

See other Ohio Mystery Animals . . .

Confirmed Black 'Leopard' Sightings in Ohio, 2011

Mountain Lion Killed in Connecticut & Big Cat sightings in Maryland and West Virginia

Ohio Mystery Canine. A Wolf in the Buckeye State?

My Visit to see where the Mothman Took Flight