Moutian lion track

Alright i need some input from guys who know what they are talking about. Missouri does have very few big cats but i personally have never seen one or any sign of one till tonight.. at least i belive thats what the track i found are ill post a picture here in a little while when my wife gets home with her camera phone and see what you guys think. when i first saw them on the snow covered logging road i thought they were tracks from a tresspasser they are pretty big way bigger than any track i have ever found. Stay tuned i hope you guys tell me im crazy because they come within 200 yards of the house. It would make since that they would be here because i have 2 acres of standing beans close by that about 50 deer have been in every night.

If you can draw an X between the toes like this it's a lion.

nope

This one walked under our tree stand. Into a corn field.

***sorry it's a photo of our photo

I think this is a panther track.

OKforester, yep

Feline track will have surface area of the toe pads ALWAYS able to "sit" within the space of the heal pad.
If no...
then it's a canine.

Toe nails or no toe nails is not a factor in identification process

What Mark June said. this IS a cat track

It's the opposite.
Canines have a negative space you can draw an X through.
Cats do not

I can't get them to load

Those cats must have bad pockets their dropping knives and pens all over the country side.

What’s this? 3 1/2 inch across

Cats have the third lobe in the middle on the heel of the pad. Canines don’t. You can see that clearly in Danny Clifton’s pic in the snow.

Thanks monster!

good read thanks guys

Yup, also very plain in yotegitters track.

Measure the stride, if you draw a line down the tracks every other track will be on the same side of the line, measure from the same point on the the track (I measure heel to heel) between two tracks on the same side of the line (there will be one track between the two you are measuring between). If the cougar is walking normally on level ground (not stalking, running or loping) a female will generally always measure around 36" stride, a mature tom will measure 40", if you are consistently getting around 38" it will be an immature tom, while one measuring 42", at least in this country, will be B&C or dang close to it. 44" is an absolute monster and I've only ever measured a couple at that, in all my years of hunting them I've measured one at 45" (several different times that I cut him, always old) never did find him fresh enough to tree to get a look at him, but that is also the only case I have ever seen of a lion killing a moose, and it was an adult cow moose.

For some reason when I try to load the photos the screen goes black where the image uploader is if that makes any since