Cougars back in Illinois

[Jon Boy]

dang how'd i miss this thread.

they're around here for sure. personally i've seen tracks down along the river. never saw one, but have heard something running very fast through the underbrush down at the trails many times over the years and it was no deer.
heck this thread just reminded me, there's a guy just outside of Albion that handles wild animals. can't think of the correct name for it, but the guy's place is like a halfway house for wild animals. supposedly he has bears, deer, big cats, etc... one day i was driving by the guys place and thought i was seeing things. here's this guy sitting on a quad next to the road and running along a low wall was what looked like a spotted snow leopard. the thing jumped up onto the quad in the guys lap and they drove up the drive.

[tri again]

Local guy wears a holoween mask on the back of his head when he's outside working.

Apparently cats would rather attack when you're not looking at them.
Real common practice in Africa is to paint eyes on the back of your head.

My most memorable story is the poor lady who got dragged off a hiking trail in s calif.

Her gf was hitting the cat with a stick and some guys came by throwing rocks and hitting it for endless minutes and the cat would NOT let go.
They were in a tug o' war with 3 or 4 people on one end and he cat on the other.

We get cougar alerts all the time with lots of livestock around.
Not much ever comes of it except for tracks.

Forest service guys came out to look at tracks and said their range is at least 50 miles so rare to catch more than one glimpse.