Ok, it's getting too much:
People, leopards and cheetahs are quite different animals!

So here a little cheatsheet:

First of all, and the most distinguishing: Face markings. If a cat has tearstripes, you face a cheetah and not a leopard. If it has none, it is a leopard. There are no leopards with tearstripes.

Second, less distinguishing: fur pattern. Cheetahs have commonly solid black dots, leopards have brown dots with a dark brown core, so called 'flowers'.

Third, uncommon fur: there are no fully-black cheetahs, only leopards with a melanistic defect. Cheetahs with the same defect picture the socalled king-cheetah pattern, in which the black dots on the back turn into stripes along the back.

#1 Face Visible?
yes: see #2
no: see #3

#2 Tearstripes?
yes: Cheetah.
no: Leopard

#3 Fur pattern:
solid black: Leopard
2-colored flowers: Leopard
mono coloted dots: Cheetah
mono colored stripes along back: Cheetah
mono colored stripes acros the back: Tiger ;)

Interesting post! I will definitely keep this in mind and possibly add it to the wiki

Another misconception to note is Huskies/other dogs and wolves, I often can't tell the difference, but some people tend to take offense even given how close they are related, kinda like the whole cheetah/leopard thing.

Linnefer said:
Ok, it's getting too much:
People, leopards and cheetahs are quite different animals!

So here a little cheatsheet:

First of all, and the most distinguishing: Face markings. If a cat has tearstripes, you face a cheetah and not a leopard. If it has none, it is a leopard. There are no leopards with tearstripes.

Second, less distinguishing: fur pattern. Cheetahs have commonly solid black dots, leopards have brown dots with a dark brown core, so called 'flowers'.

Third, uncommon fur: there are no fully-black cheetahs, only leopards with a melanistic defect. Cheetahs with the same defect picture the socalled king-cheetah pattern, in which the black dots on the back turn into stripes along the back.

#1 Face Visible?
yes: see #2
no: see #3

#2 Tearstripes?
yes: Cheetah.
no: Leopard

#3 Fur pattern:
solid black: Leopard
2-colored flowers: Leopard
mono coloted dots: Cheetah
mono colored stripes along back: Cheetah
mono colored stripes acros the back: Tiger ;)

you forgot to mention the differences between leopards and jaguars, and that leopards and jaguars and cougars are all referred to as panthers when fully black-furred, just to confuse the issue. :P

123easy said:
you forgot to mention the differences between leopards and jaguars, and that leopards and jaguars and cougars are all referred to as panthers when fully black-furred, just to confuse the issue. :P

Good point - Jaguars and leopards are distinguishable mostly by the skull form and to a degree the pattern (The head of a jaguar has single colored dots, but flowers on the rest, the floers of _jaguars are much bigger than leopards, but smaller than clouded leopards - it is harder to distinguish those two).

Cougars have a solid coat but tearstripes and no mane, you never encounter melanistic ones though. They could be misinterpreted as lions however, if you have no look on face and head (they have smaller ones and look more like housecats in build of the skull).

Alright, we need more wikis than I thought, so, who's up for the challenge in assisting to research them?

Rainbow_Dash said:
Alright, we need more wikis than I thought, so, who's up for the challenge in assisting to research them?

Ive got the time. Would just need a list of animals to search for.

Linnefer said:
Good point - Jaguars and leopards are distinguishable mostly by the skull form and to a degree the pattern (The head of a jaguar has single colored dots, but flowers on the rest, the floers of _jaguars are much bigger than leopards, but smaller than clouded leopards - it is harder to distinguish those two).

Cougars have a solid coat but tearstripes and no mane, you never encounter melanistic ones though. They could be misinterpreted as lions however, if you have no look on face and head (they have smaller ones and look more like housecats in build of the skull).

Cougars and female lions look very similar at a glance, IMO. Not such that two side by side could be confused, but if one's attacking, you won't be able to tell which is which. :P

let me bust out a flow chart and get a list going. Someone post a list of the big cats we need

Rainbow_Dash said:
let me bust out a flow chart and get a list going. Someone post a list of the big cats we need

Let's go through the Panthera:

Panthera neofelis - clouded leopard (very easy to distinguish fot its unique fur pattern - BIG brown areas with a black rim)
Panthera uncia - snow leopard (almost as leopard but grey-black)
Panthera onca - jaguar (see above - bigger spots/flowers than leopard)
Panthera leo - lion (plain sand, mane for males)
Panthera pardus - leopard (see above)
Panthera tigris - tiger (obvious)

Other Felinae:
Acinonyx jubatus - cheetah (see above)
Caracal caracal - caracal aka desert lynx (sand fur, black back of ears, brush tips on the ears)
Puma concolor - cougar aka puma aka mountain lion (sand fur, the skull and build is like a small cat in giant, also the sides of the muzzle tend to be black (giving the impression of tearstripes sometimes))

Lynx lynx - lynx ("beard", orangish fur, some black dots, brush tips on ears)
Lynx canadensis - canada lynx ("beard" with black tips, solid coat, brush tips on ears)
Lynx pardinus - iberian lynx ("beard", many many black dots, brush tips on ears)
Lynx rufus - bobcat (only small "beard", tight pattern of greyish dots, none or only tiny brush tips on ears)

Not lookead at tons of other variants (Leopardus, Felis, Catopuma, Prionailurus, Puma yagouaroundi, Pardofelis marmorata, Otocolobus manul, Leptailurus serval)

123easy said:
you forgot to mention the differences between leopards and jaguars, and that leopards and jaguars and cougars are all referred to as panthers when fully black-furred, just to confuse the issue. :P

To more confusion, or to be more specific, leaopards, tigers and lions ARE panthers, in biological terms..
Former classified as "panther", and in old days, panther was name for leopard, black panther was believed to be separate species, (they didn't knew about melanism), and tiger was called striped panther sometimes.

Though I heard, people call black cougar "Arizona" or "florida panther"