Big cat sighting

[Renard]

I saw a big black cat on my way up Beinn Ime today. I was making my way up the side of a fence in Glen Kinglas and saw big paw prints in the snow. Strange place for a dog on its own I thought. Then further up the hill I saw a big black animal which stopped to look at me then ran off up the hill. It had a long tail which it carried outwards and downwards as it ran and its gait reminded me of a hyena. It was much larger than a fox and about the size of a labrador. Later I found more tracks which didn't have any claw marks ie. retracted like a domestic cats but much larger. At one point they stopped and began again on either side of a square mesh fence. It had obviously jumped over effortlessly.

I have never taken much notice of stories of big cats roaming the wilderness so I searched for articles on big cat sightings in Argyll and found a story of a sighting in nearby Faslane earlier this year.

I am not so sceptical now.

 

[aberal]

There seems little doubt that there are big cats in the hills. Probably released pumas. A cousin of mine saw one on his farm a few years back and has found sheep which have been stripped bare.

 

[Hover Fly]

Some years (late 70s or early 80s) ago my brother, who was in the "trade", told me that the authorities had a pretty good idea of who was releasing them, it was someone from Norfolk who had been turned down from agricultural college and had a grudge against farmers. He had a licence for dangerous animals and kept four pumas and was probably breeding them, but it was all hushed up but they never quite got enough evidence to arrest him.

 

[Globalti]

There seems little doubt that there are big cats in the hills. Probably released pumas. A cousin of mine saw one on his farm a few years back and has found sheep which have been stripped bare.

Stripped bare? Disgusting! They should lock up the puma and throw away the keys.

 

[badkitty]

There are big cats around here too. One of my pals is a shepherd and skeptical until he found the sheep carcass up the tree.

I found some huge cat pawprints in the snow crossing the path in the woods on the school run which made me just a little uneasy, but I think we make so much noise that most wildlife is long gone by the time we get there.

 

[rich p]

There are big cats around here too. One of my pals is a shepherd and skeptical until he found the sheep carcass up the tree.

I found some huge cat pawprints in the snow crossing the path in the woods on the school run which made me just a little uneasy, but I think we make so much noise that most wildlife is long gone by the time we get there.

Was it a bad kitty or a good one though?

 

[Melvil]

Saw a big cat once near Ullapool in the highlands - it was the middle of the night and I'd stupidly left the door of the bothy open - I woke up and about 50 yards away there it was, and then it turned to look at me. I was a wee bit scared and didn't move an inch. Then it padded off. Obviously no-one believed me in the morning when I told them, but it was larger than the average dog, looked like a cat and was black. Does that make it a puma?

 

[mr Mag00]

a good friend of mine saw one here in dorset less than a mile from our village, a spotted large cat a few years ago. there are quite a few reports of large cats in Dorset, again with food being found up trees etc I am in no doubt of their presence.

 

[Lisa21]

There are plenty around.I personally know of two people who have released cats due to them not being prepared to go through the proper channels and become licensed to keep them.Mostly however they wont go looking for trouble and should not attack unles threatened,cornered or frightened.But they need to eat so the ones who suffer are farmers,or people who wonder why their pet has gone missing.They are beautiful animals tho,and should be respected not feared.

 

[Moodyman]

But they need to eat so the ones who suffer are farmers farmers' sheep

Corrected that for you

 

[Brains]

The Beast of Bodin Moor was a large black cat of some sort, my father saw it in the mid 1990's, but it's not been seen for the last decade or so. Whatever it was it was big enough to haul a sheep 3m up a tree

 

[heretic]

There are odd ones around in the Peak District, the late night bus drivers on the Stanton Moor run all saw one at some point, me included. Lincolnshire has a few too, there was one definitely identified through DNA testing of fur in an abandoned car a couple of years ago.

 

[Gerry Attrick]

I must confess to having my opinion changes fairly recently. As a shooter of game for over forty years, I was a total sceptic as I was certain that if such beasts existed in the wild, then we were sure to have flushed at least one whilst driving covert. We never did, nor did I ever find spoor or tracks.

However, a friend of mine who is a true old countryman and who is a falconer of many years experience, told me last year that he had spotted what appeared to him to be a big black cat whilst out with his birds. He told me exactly where he had seen it, a place I know well, and there is no obstruction on his sightline but an object subsequently measured gave scale to the animal. In addition, around the same time, a neighbour reported a sighting in our village. Two nights later, I discovered very large pawprints around our chicken pen.

 

[biggs682]

who knows what lurks out in the middle of nowhere

 

[slowmotion]

Anybody remember The Surrey Puma?

http://en.wikipedia....iki/Surrey_Puma

http://news.bbc.co.uk/local/surrey/hi/people_and_places/nature/newsid_8520000/8520071.stm