I was in the, "they don't exist" camp for many years, until a melanistic mountain lion sat in my CO driveway one
afternoon, and crossed the road in front of my pickup two days later. He jumped a fence going sharply uphill,
and his belly was so dark it seemed dark orange, but his back and sides could easily be called "black", and that
would be the one description that works best. If you can accept "panther" as cougar, puma or mountain lion,
then, "black" ones do exist.
