Rain showers early becoming more intermittent for the afternoon. High 84F. Winds SE at 5 to 10 mph. Chance of rain 40%..

Showers this evening then scattered thunderstorms developing overnight. Low 71F. Winds light and variable. Chance of rain 60%.

It had been a long day. As a counselor at YMCA Camp Ocoee, I’d led my cabin full of 9- and 10-year-old boys on a canoe camping expedition to the wild side of Parksville Lake — across from the shoreline navigated by U.S. Highway 64 in southeastern Tennessee.

After finding a flat place to camp, we’d set up tents, cleaned the campsite of trash and gathered wood for a fire. After supper and a couple of ghost stories, they bedded down in a large tent and I rolled out my sleeping bag inside a pup tent.

Before I even had time to shut my eyes, I heard it — something that sounded like a small horse was trotting through the woods. It stopped. I wondered. Then the most frightening noise I’d ever heard in my young life pierced the night air. It was like a cross between a woman screaming and a baby crying.

I wanted to stay in my tent, but what about the kids? I knew they were probably still chattering a bit before falling asleep. Figuring out by now it was some kind of cat, I quickly exited my tent to fearful cries of “Did you hear that?” and “What is it?” My only thought was building up the fire. I was 19 years old.

With a growing blaze in the fire ring behind me and a heavy-duty flashlight in hand, I found the big cat in the woodline. He wasn’t moving, and we weren’t either. The long day turned into a longer night, and at the first light of dawn I awakened my most responsible camper and told him to keep an eye out while I grabbed some shuteye. During the night, I had lost sight of the feline drifter who was obviously prowling his territory for food left by campers and considered us intruders.

Back at base camp, a senior counselor told me it was likely a lynx. I thought those cousins to our southern bobcats were native to the northern states, but to my recollection I didn’t question him further in a reportorial fashion. I had a cabin full of boys to tend to.

Earlier this year when a colleague in our Marine Corps League detachment read that story in my book “Wild, But True, Stories of the Outdoors” he called me. Bill Arthur of Dalton shared a riveting account of meeting a panther while he was riding a motorcycle many years ago; it was near the old slaughterhouse on Legion Drive — and it was black. (A story is coming soon.)

Then a few weeks after speaking with Bill while I was delivering the Ellijay Times-Courier, a store clerk showed me a photo taken by her roommate in late June of an alleged panther on their property. Well, it doesn’t take a semi-retired newsman to smell a story brewing there, so I began what turned out to be a weeks-long investigation. After visiting the woman who took the big cat photo and checking the data on her phone, I felt a story was warranted. By the way, Roundtop Road — the location of the sighting in southern Gilmer County — is just across from the Murray County side of Carters Lake.

It’s only fair that state wildlife officials get to weigh in on alleged big cat activity, and yet it appears from comments through the years by North Georgia mountain residents that those officers cast a jaundiced eye toward panther sightings. Perhaps it’s because they say they haven’t found bona fide evidence they’re here, and I’m OK with that. However, when people who know what they look like have seen them — people you know and trust — there has to be some credibility there. One woman I’ve known since high school and served with on several boards in Murray and Whitfield told me she and her husband have seem them on several occasions around Crandall. I trust her and him.

And so until one is killed by a hunter or a vehicle — and a photo of it is published — it appears the controversy will continue. Adam Hammond, a wildlife biologist with the state Department of Natural Resources, sent me an interesting link of a newscast in Oklahoma. There had been a verified sighting, but get this: A wildlife official said the panthers — aka cougars, pumas and mountain lions — are just passing through. In other words, there’s not a breeding population.

So there’s your “suffering succotash” explanation (per Sylvester the “puddy cat” of Looney Tunes cartoon fame), if you’ll accept it. Then again, the sightings around here may be those of a “wampus cat,” defined as “a cat-like creature in American folklore that varies widely in appearance, ranging from frightful to comical, depending on region,” according to academically-suspect Wikipedia. (There’s actually a statue of a six-legged wampus cat at Conway High School in Arkansas, where one would have to acknowledge — with its four legs for running and two for fighting — it serves as a fearsome mascot.)

Let’s close with another cat story. As I was leaving the old Gilmer High School campus one day after covering a Bobcats football practice, I almost ran into — drum roll, please — an actual bobcat on the hill above the main entrance. In a classic “fight or flight” moment, it froze for a heartbeat, then took off for the woods after sizing up my vehicle.

Those are my stories, and I’m stickin’ to ‘em.

Mark Millican is a former staff writer for the Dalton Daily Citizen.

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