February 16, 2008
I’ve received the following four photos so many times lately, I figured I better address the flow of alerts to me about them. The email usually is labeled “Kitty, Kitty, Kitty.” The location is given as someplace familiar and near you. I saw copies of these, wow, first about five years ago. It is amazing they are making a return appearance.
Therefore, let me just mention them here as they are not what they seem to be.
These are nothing more than what must be termed an internet rural legend!
I guess some would call them a hoax.
They are not startling photographic proof of the return of the eastern panther in whatever location your email sent you told you. They were, instead, taken in Wyoming. Read more here and at the end of this negative article about “panther paranoia.”
The unfortunate whiplash of these photographs is that they tend to make it harder for real eyewitnesses of actual eastern mystery cats to be taken seriously.
About Loren Coleman
Loren Coleman is one of the world’s leading cryptozoologists, some say “the” leading living cryptozoologist. Certainly, he is acknowledged as the current living American researcher and writer who has most popularized cryptozoology in the late 20th and early 21st centuries.
Starting his fieldwork and investigations in 1960, after traveling and trekking extensively in pursuit of cryptozoological mysteries, Coleman began writing to share his experiences in 1969. An honorary member of Ivan T. Sanderson’s Society for the Investigation of the Unexplained in the 1970s, Coleman has been bestowed with similar honorary memberships of the North Idaho College Cryptozoology Club in 1983, and in subsequent years, that of the British Columbia Scientific Cryptozoology Club, CryptoSafari International, and other international organizations. He was also a Life Member and Benefactor of the International Society of Cryptozoology (now-defunct).
Loren Coleman’s daily blog, as a member of the Cryptomundo Team, served as an ongoing avenue of communication for the ever-growing body of cryptozoo news from 2005 through 2013. He returned as an infrequent contributor beginning Halloween week of 2015.
Coleman is the founder in 2003, and current director of the International Cryptozoology Museum in Portland, Maine.
Filed under Alien Big Cats, Cryptotourism, CryptoZoo News, Cryptozoologists, Cryptozoology, Hoaxes, Mystery Cats, Out of Place, Photos, Pop Culture