Sunday, November 6, 2011

We got us a panther

Last Sunday I wrote, at the end of a I Heart Macro post, about my neighbor seeing a panther.  This neighbor did put up an infrared camera, but so far she has only seen some fox, birds, and house cats.  But today I spoke to two other neighbors who have definitely seen the panther.  The kids who live on the other side were playing in the woods behind their house and saw it and their uncle saw it also while sitting on the deck behind the house.  Perhaps their will be something on film soon.
The neighbor across the street recently saw a fairly large bobcat on some property he owns on the other side of town, but he estimates it was only 45 lbs.  A Florida panther like the one on the photo below might weigh 130 lbs. and be seven feet long.   The picture shows a Georgia Wildlife Resources Division biologist with the panther shot by a deer hunter three years ago.   Here is a story in which DNA testing positively linked this panther killed and the Georgia-Alabama border to the South Florida population.
source
This is a great story about Florida Panthers in South Georgia.  And here is a fact sheet with video and pictures about the Florida panther (aka, mountain lion, cougar, puma).  According to the fact sheet, we have all the panther's favorite foods in our yard, and the neighbors have two piglets - Peaches and Milkshake - for dessert.  Let's hope he doesn't like corgis.

4 comments:

  1. Oh that is scary....I hope you DON'T get to see it on infrared! Even though it would be cool! Hope your neighbour keeps those piglets locked up!
    jenni

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  3. Poor Panthers :((
    Wouldn't it be possibly I wonder to catch them to save them from human ? I feel sorry for the animals :(

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  4. Panthers (we call them mtn.lion in the Northwest) are making a huge comeback across the whole continent. Places where they haven't been spotted in decades are reporting sitings. Place like the surburbs of Chicago, New York,and Boston have all had verified sitings. The Wildlife departments and Gov't agencies try to discredit and deny sitings inorder to avoid a panic from the general public . However, Panthers avoid human contact and since they can detect us long before we can spot them they usually go undetected. I live in WA state where the Cougar pop. is near 5000. Have I ever seen one...no...but they are out there. We don't let the dog out alone after dark. We have seen eyes watching us in the dark. Neighbors have seen cougars. We grow them big up here, close to 300lbs. I find it refreshing that in my backyard the Cougars thrive, the grizzlies and wolves have returned. Its also nice to hear the Florida subspecies is making a comeback. Cheers to the big cat!

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