Comment by kulahan
10 hours ago
The wiki article on it says it was known to locals. I think the problem is that they kept describing tilcayo, and everyone who wasn't there but was listening said "Oh that sounds exactly like an oncilla. must be a second name or something."
Yeah that's what I'm curious about. "Known to locals" is very vague, and there are a lot of situations that could fit that description. The situation you mention is probably the most reasonable concrete interpretation, but my guess is that there was a game of telephone from locals -> scientists -> journalists -> wiki, and any nuance we could read into has been lost.