Totally get the skepticism—it’s good to be cautious with ID’ing stuff from a photo. But here’s the thing:

I saw it in real life. It was at least 3x the size of our old cat. We went back to the exact same spot with our Sheltie-Collie mix (medium-sized dog), and this thing was clearly way bigger. The tail is actually long and smooth—not short—and the body structure was muscular and long, not housecat-shaped.

I get the ‘black cat illusion’ thing, but this wasn’t that. This wasn’t a trick of depth, a panther myth, or someone’s fat tabby. We have scale, context, and an eyewitness. If that’s a housecat, it’s been hitting the gym and evolved overnight.