Mystery Cats

Track of the Cat’s Bezzerides Dies

A.I. Bezzerides, 98, a novelist-turned-screenwriter best known for post-World War II film noir classics such as Kiss Me Deadly, On Dangerous Ground and Thieves’ Highway , died January 1, 2007, after a brief illness. Albert Isaac Bezzerides was born Aug. 9, 1908, in Samsun, Turkey. His mother was Armenian and his father a Turkish-speaking Greek. He moved to America with his parents by age 2, and they settled in Fresno, where his father worked in the fields before becoming a produce-hauling trucker. He is perhaps most remembered for a style he applied to his best-remembered work, the 1938 novel Long [...]

Top Twelve Black Bobcat Hot Spots

UPDATED: January 14, 2007. Photograph of a cryptid black felid taken late in 2005 in Florida, by a Georgia professor (credit Ben Willis) that probably is a melanistic bobcat (Lynx rufus floridianus). Based on one of yesterday’s melanistic bobcat blog comments, here are my promised suggestions for the hot spots to go observe these black felids. Top Twelve Locations To See Black Bobcats 1-10. South Florida. If there’s one place that has produced the most melanistic bobcats, it would be this south central east Florida coast county that lies next to the Okeechobee Swamp region, specifically, Martin County, Florida. Ten [...]

Maeher: Melanistic Bobcats in Florida

Dr. Dave Maehr’s 1990 article details the discoveries of black bobcats in Florida. Please see below his Florida location chart (numbers 1 and 2 are from 1939-1940 through the 1990 captures). Click on image for full size version Also here is a photograph from 1990 of a black Florida bobcat. Click on image for full size version The pdf of Maehr’s 1990 report he co-authored, can be downloaded by clicking on its title here: "Melanistic Bobcats in Florida". Melanistic felid photographed by Georgia Tech’s biology professor (ret.) Edward Yeargers, Martin County, Florida, December 2005.

Mystery Black Felid Photo: Identified

An update on the mystery black felid photograph (see various enhancements on this page) reveals some new information, which, in context, makes much sense. The picture was taken December 2005, according to the photographer’s letter shared with me last night by felid researcher Ben Willis. The photo was taken by a retired biology professor from a Georgia university, Dr. Edward Yeargers . Dr. Yeargers had seen the cat, which he identified as a black bobcat, “several times” in his yard. The location of his yard – Palm City, Florida. Palm City is located in Martin County, Florida. The professor wrote, [...]

Nashville And Bobbing Black Cats

Nashville Cats, play clean as country water Nashville Cats, play wild as mountain dew Nashville Cats, been playin’ since they’s babies Nashville Cats, get work before they’re two — by John B. Sebastian, Lovin’ Spoonful, 1967. Is this cryptid black cat a melanistic bobcat (Lynx rufus/Felis rufus)? Back on November 19, 2006, I wrote about the sightings and then videotape of a large short-tailed cat seen in Nashville, Tennessee. Speculations covered caracal, lynx, and bobcat. The two images below are from the video taken of the Tennessee Mystery Cat: Ben Willis of Bigcats.org brings to my attention that a road-killed [...]