Hey Jerry...........
Sixteen years ago almost to the day I had a black Jaguar cross my path, SIXTY MILES NORTH OF YUMA!
We were on the Arizona side of the Colorado River in the Trigo Mountain Wilderness Area. That area is heavily wooded with Cottonwoods, Willows and Mesquites near the water and the washes that cut into the west side of the Trigos have thick stands of Ironwoods and Palo Verdes. We were in one of my Wranglers pushing through some thick brush in a narrow sandy wash and decided to stop for a pee and a fresh Pacifico. No more than fifty feet from us a BIG black cat hopped out of a Palo Verde thicket and calmly walked across the wash. It stopped in the middle of the wash, gave us a stare-down and slowly made its way to the other side, hopped into the brush and was gone. From that day on I never leave the Jeep without my S&W 38 Special on my hip as per the one in my hand on my avatar above.
I reported the sighting to the BLM here in Yuma and they must of thought I was crazy as no one ever contacted me for a follow up. At first we thought it was a Mountain Lion in a dark color phase but as I learned later Pumas don't have a dark phase. That particular region along the Colorado is loaded with deer, big horns, burros and wild cattle. We see occasionally see Cougars and Bobcats on our expeditions but nothing like the animal we saw that day.
Most people aren't aware of the fact that the Gila River and the lower Colorado River flood plains were forests of Cottonwoods and Willows before the dams were constructed. Thousands of long dead Cottonwood trunks can still be seen piled up along the Gila from Painted Rock Dam westward. There are many reports of Jaguars being killed in those areas less than one hundred years ago.
When I was stationed in Panama with the 210th. Combat Aviation Battalion I saw many Jaguars from our Hueys, sometimes walking along dirt trails and even swimming across the canal and Gatun Lake to the many islands there. The favorite food of those cats in Panama was domestic dogs and the Green Iguana. When I lived there in base housing at Howard AFB no one left their dogs out at night as the jungle was just across the street from the bungalos.
JJ
