Canadian Lion

Although lions historically lived in Canada and the United States in the Pleistocene 10,000 years ago, sightings continue. Unlike African Lions, they had a much fluffier coat, darker fur and they were larger, at five-eight ft long and three-four ft at the shoulder.

On march 4th 1941, in Gagetown, New Brunswick, four people on horseback spotted a 6.5 ft long cougar-like animal. They described it as resembling a cougar, but having yellowish-grey hair and a long flowing mane. In the mid 1950’s, a man from Nelson House in northern Manitoba claimed he shot and killed a lion. Other people in the community said that once he killed the “lion”, many of their sled dogs stopped being killed. In June of 1960, in Kapuskasing, Ontario, Leo Paul Dallaire watched an animal resembling an African lion on his farm. It was light tan and had a mane and a 4-foot tail with a bushy tip. The horses got spooked and the lion ran away. Some reports of phantom lions in the Nahanni Valley have been reported, but are often lumped together with the waheela, another large carnivorous cryptid in the area. Sightings of Canadian Lions are rare, as most sightings of phantom lions in North America occur in the plains of Central United States.

​