The appearance of the Wampus Cat varies wildly though generally it's a cat-like creature that terrorizes neighborhoods. It is also sometimes described as being half-cat and half-dog.[1] In west Texas, it's reported to be nocturnal in nature and infamous for its terribly loud "raucous voice". In Washington State, it's thought to shed its whiskers, white ones by day and black ones by night. It is also often depicted as being a fearsome water-panther, having fur as "black as dusk".[2] In non-Native American cultures, it's said that it has glowing yellow eyes that can pierce through people's souls and drive them insane.[1] It is also sometimes reported to walk on its hind legs.[3]

In the 1939 Fearsome Critters book, the Wampus Cat is depicted as a bipedal cat the size of the Maine coon cat having tufted ears, the tail of a lion, sharp claws, whiskers, a comical smile and a right forearm like a folding pruning hook but on the pantographic principle, thanks to Nature who endowed the marvelous Wampus Cat with that amazing right forearm. The Wampus Cat lives in Idaho and its scientific name is Aquilamappreluendens forcipe. The Wampus Cat was first seen and introduced since the first specimen of the Wampus Cat was discovered scratching false blazes on mountain trails, and because of that, the Wampus Cat is blamed for a variety of forest tribulations. Females can only be killed with a crosscut saw and the males are practically but not completely indestructible with the germ of blister rust in their fur. The glare from their eyes is said to start forest fires under the full moon's influence. Their footprints are only visible in solid rock. The Wampus Cat steals prospectors' picks to brush its teeth. If the Wampus Cat wades across a stream, the fish won't bite for a week. When the Wampus Cat is on the prowl, the only game is the fool hen. The howl of the Wampus Cat on a lonely night curdles a crock of sourdough. The Wampus Cat lurks on a craggy promontory with its tufted ears aslant like the budding prongs of a young goat. The Wampus Cat can change its voice from the customary howl of a disenfranchised banshee to the bleat of a kid.

Now the Wampus Cat, still abundant in its native Idaho and particularly large and violent during the season when the crop of dudes yields a bushel to the picket-line, has the opportunity to redeem itself as good. The Wampus Cat's favorite pastime is catching eagles, which is very convenient for the trappers of Salmon River who believe eagles regularly kill deer and who know the game department and the eagle lovers aren't going to agree on a constructive response.

The simple solution, created by what's known as the Wampus Society (named after the Wampus Cat) which is composed of every human, regardless of gender and age who has seen the rampant Wampus Cat at dusk menacing and threatening cougars with jackhammers, is that the burden be turned over to the Wampus breed, and that once the Wampus Cat has reached the eagle country, the feathers will fly. When an eagle approaches, the strange arm shoots out with astonishing speed and direction. The eagle is caught and reeled in.

If the Wampus Cat is hungry, it will eat the whole eagle. If the Wampus Cat's mood is playful, it extracts the eagle's tail fan and releases the bird. The feathers are then given to Native Americans. Surprisingly, the Wampus Cat is friendly and benevolent to Native Americans, and this has been offered as one reason why the Native Americans never turned in the Wampus Cat's fur. Primitive trappers also declared that the hide runs mostly on quills and the colors are akin to those of a Christmas necktie

The origin of the Wampus Cat, on the authority of the mountain men of Stanley Basin, dates back to a beaver in an old-fashioned tale. It seems that a trapper's dog surprised a beaver far from water and there was nothing for the beaver to do but to climb a tree. But beavers cannot climb trees. So the beaver becomes the Wampus Cat.

Once the Wampus Cat is lured to the bailiwick of the wicked Salmon River eagles, the quick-witted Wampus Cat swiftly eradicates the fowls of the air, and spares the wild turkeys released as game there. The Wampus Cat knows the eagle, but trouble is anticipated when the eagle and the turkey cross into a new species known as the Turkeagle, and the Wampus Cat cannot tell them apart because it cannot spell.

The biggest puzzle brought to the attention of the Wampus Society is how to dispose of the Wampus Cat once it has exterminated the pernicious eagle. Gorged on its favorite food and happy in the free and wild environment of the Middle Fork, the Wampus Cat decided to stay permanently. No predator has been known to live on the Wampus Cat's flesh meat, and the Wampus Cat became a plague worse than the eagle it had been called upon to exterminate.

However, only the Whiffenpoof, also living in Idaho, can put the Wampus Cat to rout, and the Whiffenpoof has the way, but seldom the will. The Whiffenpoof comes down both sides of a perfectly circular lake or river at once. This makes the deadly Wampus Cat unable to make up its mind on which flank to attack, so it folds its pantographic arm and resolves itself into a midnight screech.[4]

The Wampus Cat is the mascot of Clark Fork Secondary/Senior High School, Conway High School, Atoka High School, Itasca High School and Leesville High School. Conway High School depicts it with six legs while Clark Fork Secondary/Senior High School depicts it as closer to the Ball-tailed Cat.

There are many tales of the Wampus Cat in Cherokee mythology. In one tale, the Wampus Cat is known as the Ewah, a Cherokee woman who did not trust her husband. This woman's husband went out to hunt with his fellow warrior. Suspicious, the woman put on a mountain lion coat and went to spy on him. When she was found out, the medicine man punished her by forcing her to wear the skin forever, transforming her spirit into the Wampus Cat.[3]

Another tale tells the story of husband and wife Standing Bear and Running Deer. Standing Bear, the strongest warrior, went out to battle with the Ewah who was terrorizing their village. Eventually Standing Bear returned, driven insane by the Ewah and a shell of the warrior he once was. Running Deer wanted revenge for her husband and went to the shamans, who gave her the mask of a bobcat's face and covered her body with black paste to hide her scent. After days of searching for the Ewah, Running Deer finally saw the Ewah and crept up to surprise it. Having seen her bobcat mask, the Ewah's magic turned in on itself, banishing it for good. It is said that Running Deer's spirit now inhabits the Wampus Cat, who continues to watch over and protect her village.[5]

Other tales tell of a witch who lived alone in the mountains. At night, she would turn herself into a cat and steal chickens and pigs from nearby farms.[3]

The Wampus Cat is thought to have been responsible for killing livestock in the Appalachian and Southern areas. Reports of the Wampus Cat first came about in the first half of the 19th Century with sightings continuing to this day.[6][7]

Willy McQuillian from the AIMS team on the show Mountain Monsters encountered it when he was nine years old. His parents told him to get something from the shed late at night. He went out and came face to face with a jet black panther-like creature with glowing eyes. The creature gave a weird high-pitched hissing like sound, which frightened him back inside his house. Many years later, on his same farm, he had the same kind of encounter with the beast, precisely like the encounter he had as a 9 year old, he also lost a lot of his pigs to the creature. Another meeting around the same area happened when a lady was driving a school bus late at night, and a creature that was black and large leaped out of the woods in front of the bus.