Big Cat Sighting

[horselover101]

I can't say i'm a skeptic because i'm not. I honestly do believe that once upon a time.. big cats have escaped from wildlife parks and zoo's or have simply been let go into the wild when the law came in that you had to have a 'dangerous animal licence' to own animals like that.

I have two stories to tell:

The first was some fifteen years ago... my Grandparents saw it, not me. They were driving home, near sunderland coming through a wooded area. It wasn't dark so they could see clearly. Over the wall on one side of the road, a large sandy coloured cat dropped down and stopped in the middle of the road, looking round at them. My grandad stopped the car and he could see it perfect. He described it to be a puma type cat. It wasn't a dog and it defiantly wasn't a regular moggy! A few seconds later, it simply turned and jumped up onto the wall on the other side and disapeered into the field.

The second time, both me and my stepdad saw it. I'd been helping him at work one night so we were coming back late. Where we lived, It was right beside fields with horses. Our house was directly in the middle, so you had to walk through a path along the field to reach the house. It was dark, around 11 o'clock but the field was lit with street lamps and lights where the path was. My stepdad spotted it first and then when i turned i saw it. It was walking slowly along the top of a small grass ridge and i could see it perfectly. The streetlamp illuminated it and it was defiantly a big, black cat. No doubt about it. Let's just say we certainly didn't stick around to see it any longer.

Believe me or not, i don't care. But honestly, i know what i saw. It was defiantly not a dog. I get that people are skeptical, after all, how many other hoax's are out there. The lock ness monster.. bigfoot.. How can you say they're myths if you haven't seen them yourself... but also, how can you say there are not big cats around? You honestly never know. It's understandable to be skeptic like i said, but i know exactly what i saw and no one will change my mind.

-Amy

[Meta menardi]

I have to say that when you read posts about pink butterflies, strange birds and many other things, the "Big Cat" thing always gets ridiculed. Maybe because of so much of it is anecdotal.

I shall post my anecdote, and it is very non-exciting and no more than a curiosity.

I had until recently a house at the very edge of a large expanse of moorland (Trough of Bowland). The hill at the back of the house was a long (half mile of more) expanse of rough grazing, often stocked with Swaledale cross ewes. The night in question, they were all at one end of the grazing, and the night passed till about 5.00 a.m., when I was woken up by what I can only describe as an eerie screaming sound, prolonged and very loud. I looked out of the window (no curtains, what is there to hide and from who?), and all the sheep ran in a total panic to the other end of the grazing, quite a distance. Hill sheep are as daft as any sheep, but not what you would call panicky, and I have lived in the country almost all my life, that cry was not a fox or a bird. I am not implying anything, but it has left questions in my mind. I was told by the nearest neighbour that there had been sightings of a Big Cat just up the road.

If you look at the Forest of Bowland, there is an expanse of moor nearly 40 miles across, hardly cut by any roads.

Well, that's blown my credibility, even though all I have done is tell a story of what mt experience has been. Sounds like a Conan Doyle tale.

[montagu]

Originally Posted by christ1979

Im all for the possibility of big cats in the UK, but that is a dogs paw print.

I've seen many so-called 'Big Cat' footprints presented like this- they invariably turn out to be Dog Footprints, with the distinctive arrangement of the pads(two up, two to the side) which this photo shows.

People want to believe what they have seen is something unusual- even in the light of overriding evidence to the contrary.

[crazyjoe123]

Apologies I have not read all of the posts so I hope I dont repeat anything already said. There are surely some exotic cats in the UK. I have worked in Jo'burg where there are regularly pieces of evidence of urban leopards but rarely any sightings. But in the UK the huge increase in exotic mammals as pets and particularly wild derived pets such as Bengal cats which (I dont know the specifics) are lets say 2nd generation hybrids of leopard cats. Small exotic cats, just like exotic birds, amphibs, reptiles which regularly escape must be present, even in tiny numbers for at least short periods of time, in the UK. I know 1 cat keeper from a small UK zoo who had 2 serval escape. It was never reported due to DEFRA or the police (the animals were not part of a studbook, I believe they were a pair of inbred offspring inadvertently bred). Whether these lived for 2 days or 2 years, they are/were out in the UK.
Sustainable, viable populations of any species. Almost definately not. Tales of leopard, lion etc. nope
Tiny numbers of escapees/deliberate releases. Very probable.