Replies

Dang Grammy,

You all be careful. Several months ago I received an email alert from the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service asking anyone with cougar sightings to report these, in fact the USFWS put up a special page online for these reports, since they are receiving so many sightings.

The news release stated the USFWS (and most state wildlife agencies) still don’t believe there are cougars present in the southeastern U.S., except for perhaps some domesticated and released cats.

However, I thought it was odd they went to all that trouble and fanfare to ask folks to report sightings.A few years ago they just ignored them. A state wildlife biologist did find a track (and preserved it) in the Tullahoma/Sewannee area in middle Tennessee several years ago, and he was certain it was a large cat, not a bobcat.

Wayne and I heard a big cat in our woods once. I heard it first, then he said he also heard what was definitely a big cat. I am assuming mine was a bobcat, we have a lot of these on public lands and they are legal to hunt in this state.

On Tndeer.com they have a lot of discussion on this. There are several hunters, who spend a lot of time in large tracts of woods, that claim to have seen them. These are folks who know what a bobcat looks like, and most have harvested bobcats. Some even have trail camera shots that do appear to be big yellow cats.

Keep me informed about your visitor, and be cautious.