Anyone else seen a big black cat near the Ozarks? Third time this month for me

Never been near the Ozarks myself but we've had the exact same thing going on in Kent for years. Big black cats, multiple credible witnesses, the occasional mangled livestock that the authorities immediately chalk up to "a dog" or "natural causes." Classic deflection.

Three sightings in a month is significant though. Are we talking genuinely massive, like out-of-proportion-to-any-normal-cat massive? Because that's the key detail most people gloss over. Thier size estimate compared to nearby reference points tells you a lot about whether you're looking at a feral moggy having a good run or something that genuinely shouldn't be there.

The Ozarks terrain would suit a big predator perfectly, decent cover, plenty of deer. Honestly wouldn't surprise me at all if there's a breeding population that's been there for decades and the wildlife authorities simply don't want the headache of admitting it. Happens here constantly.

Keep a camera on you and try to get something in frame with it for scale next time. That's the only thing that shuts the sceptics up, temporarily at least.

@AberdeenLurker the Kent sightings have been going on since at least the 80s, there's a decent amount of documented cases if you dig through the British Big Cats Society archives. The working theory for most of these - both UK and US - is escaped or released exotic pets after the Dangerous Wild Animals Act 1976 came in. People just let them go rather than pay for licences. Melanistic leopards and pumas are the usual suspects. What gets me with the Ozarks reports though is the sheer size people describe, bigger than any leopard should be. Either witnesses are bad at judging scale in low light, which happens, or theres something else going on. The livestock damage pattern is usually what convinces me a report is genuine rather than a misidentified dog or whatever.