Legend Cat

IS THE "LEGEND CAT^TM" REAL?

If we go back to the beginning of this country's history, beyond what is written, we find from excavations on the Atlantic coastline, that Vikings settled briefly there. It is estimated that this occurred in approximately 1000 AD.
Did they bring cats with them?

Count de Buffon's Natural History, written in 1767, (translated by William Smellie) states: "The wild cat existed in America before its discovery by the Europeans. A hunter brought one of them to Christopher Columbus, which was of an ordinary size, of a brownishgray color and having a very long and strong tail."

The all encompassing question is, what was this cat found at the time when Columbus discovered America? Because of its average housecat coloring, size, and tail length we cannot consider it to be one of the 5 wild cat breeds found on this continent, (being the cougar, bobcat, lynx, jaguarundi and ocelot), knowing that this description fits none of them. Therefore, we must consider the two alternate possibilities.

Either it was an average European housecat or it was a bobcat hybrid. There are no other choices. Now if it was an average housecat, Felis Catus, the species would have had to survive over two hundred years, being the progeny of cats brought with the Vikings. Not likely in the wilds of America! Also, would not the hunter and Columbus have identified it as such? Would they not have been amazed that the common cat lived also in the New Land? The answer is obviously YES! But this cat is not described as a domestic cat.

Again, it is described as being a ".... ordinary size... brownishgray coloring... long and strong tail." If a bobcat (sire) breeds a domestic (queen), the kittens will, as expected, physically resemble the mother, since we know that the queen contributes over 60% of the phenotype. An average size and a brownishgray coloring would be quite expected in a litter from such a combination. Brownishgray is exactly the coloration used to describe the bobcat! None of the other wild cats in America are described as being brownishgray. As far as a very long and strong tail goes, with the bobcat gene being recessive to the dominant domestic, a long tail would not be unexpected. Documentation collected from people all over the country records that kittens born from wild bobcat/domestic matings are more often born with the domestic tail. Therefore, it appears that the unique short and characteristically articulated bobcat tail is likely to be recessive.

Theory aside, science rejects the notion of a bobcat breeding with a domestic, believing that the continually negative DNA test results disprove the existence of a "Legend CatTM" (or first generation NATURAL HYBRID). However, we do not accept this assessment, since so little is actually known about this subject and DNA testing has not been accurate, with a control sample from a full wild cat failing the test. We must consider, as well, that first generation wolf/dogs also display negative wild DNA test results. Therefore, we believe the "legends", (some of these are actually found in old books), often describing the courtship and kittens born from such a mating. This is not a completely unique situation. In fact, in the British Isles, the European Wild Cat, being slightly larger than the domestic (comparable to many of the bobcat sub-species), is doing exactly the same thing, much to the consternation of the scientists there.

History cannot be disputed. If the cat brought to Columbus was not a cougar, bobcat, lynx, jaguarundi (not living in the area of discovery) or beautifully coated ocelot, then it must have been a hybrid, or even better, it was the progeny, many generations removed, from the original hybrid to hybrid matings.

If this attempt to prove the existence of a "Legend Cat™" appears to be only "wild" speculation, then you tell me, what else could it have been?

THERE IS SIMPLY NO OTHER
EXPLANATION!

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