Big Cats in UK

Monty Pigeon

Monty Pigeon

Striker
Extraordinary how the evidence, even now - with most people carrying high quality phone cameras - tends to be blurry and inconclusive.

A new documentary on Amazon is supposed to have irrefutable evidence in the shape of a photo allegedly taken in Staffordshire. However, there is only partial information about when it was taken - 'March 17', but no year is given - and the scale looks completely wrong. It looks like a zoo black leopard photoshopped into a close-up of a lawn.

www.dailymail.co.uk

Documentary makers find 'clearest ever' photo of panther-like creature

The picture was discovered in the files of a zoology organisation and shows a large muscular black cat lying in long grass in Smallthorne, Staffordshire.
www.dailymail.co.uk www.dailymail.co.uk

The source seems to have been identified.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1691078885310398464
 


Big cats exist in the UK, I know because I've seen one myself, when I was on a Grand Central train. While traveling from Sunderland to London King's Cross, the train slowed down to a crawl, while traveling through Nottinghamshire, yes I have a smart phone but I was watching something on it and when the train had slowed right down I looked out of the window, and in a farmers Field a big cat was prowling next to a hedge at the edge of the field, fairly near a house. It was definitely a big cat which looked like a black panther. Either the owners keep big cats that are free to roam (which would be illegal) or it was wild.

I thought I was seeing things, I tried to get my phone to take a photo or video, but then the signal must have changed and the train speed up and within a couple of seconds we were past the field.
 
Monty Pigeon said:
Extraordinary how the evidence, even now - with most people carrying high quality phone cameras - tends to be blurry and inconclusive.

A new documentary on Amazon is supposed to have irrefutable evidence in the shape of a photo allegedly taken in Staffordshire. However, there is only partial information about when it was taken - 'March 17', but no year is given - and the scale looks completely wrong. It looks like a zoo black leopard photoshopped into a close-up of a lawn.

www.dailymail.co.uk

Documentary makers find 'clearest ever' photo of panther-like creature

The picture was discovered in the files of a zoology organisation and shows a large muscular black cat lying in long grass in Smallthorne, Staffordshire.
www.dailymail.co.uk www.dailymail.co.uk

The source seems to have been identified.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1691078885310398464
Click to expand...
The Hylton Dene Deer would knack that
 
royaldragon said:
Big cats exist in the UK, I know because I've seen one myself, when I was on a Grand Central train. While traveling from Sunderland to London King's Cross, the train slowed down to a crawl, while traveling through Nottinghamshire, yes I have a smart phone but I was watching something on it and when the train had slowed right down I looked out of the window, and in a farmers Field a big cat was prowling next to a hedge at the edge of the field, fairly near a house. It was definitely a big cat which looked like a black panther. Either the owners keep big cats that are free to roam (which would be illegal) or it was wild.

I thought I was seeing things, I tried to get my phone to take a photo or video, but then the signal must have changed and the train speed up and within a couple of seconds we were past the field.
Click to expand...

There may be the odd short-term escapee, but I don't think there's an established population. There'd be spoor and remains of kills.

I know for certain that there have been exotic wild cats in the UK. My first job, in the late 80s, was at a zoo. Police brought us an unidentified animal that had been found dead on a road on the Isle of Wight. We were able to confirm that it was an African golden cat. An amazing animal that, at the time, was not present in any UK zoo, and there was no record of it being in any private collection. To date it's the only one I've ever seen. It's only thanks to camera traps that we now have photos of the species in the wild. (Camera traps, incidentally, are widely used to photograph our native fauna, and yet don't seem to have picked up any big cats.)

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Monty Pigeon said:
Extraordinary how the evidence, even now - with most people carrying high quality phone cameras - tends to be blurry and inconclusive.

A new documentary on Amazon is supposed to have irrefutable evidence in the shape of a photo allegedly taken in Staffordshire. However, there is only partial information about when it was taken - 'March 17', but no year is given - and the scale looks completely wrong. It looks like a zoo black leopard photoshopped into a close-up of a lawn.

www.dailymail.co.uk

Documentary makers find 'clearest ever' photo of panther-like creature

The picture was discovered in the files of a zoology organisation and shows a large muscular black cat lying in long grass in Smallthorne, Staffordshire.
www.dailymail.co.uk www.dailymail.co.uk

The source seems to have been identified.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1691078885310398464
Click to expand...
The pic on the right. The cats left eye is not in the same place as the other pic.
 
Monty Pigeon said:
Extraordinary how the evidence, even now - with most people carrying high quality phone cameras - tends to be blurry and inconclusive.

A new documentary on Amazon is supposed to have irrefutable evidence in the shape of a photo allegedly taken in Staffordshire. However, there is only partial information about when it was taken - 'March 17', but no year is given - and the scale looks completely wrong. It looks like a zoo black leopard photoshopped into a close-up of a lawn.

www.dailymail.co.uk

Documentary makers find 'clearest ever' photo of panther-like creature

The picture was discovered in the files of a zoology organisation and shows a large muscular black cat lying in long grass in Smallthorne, Staffordshire.
www.dailymail.co.uk www.dailymail.co.uk

The source seems to have been identified.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1691078885310398464
Click to expand...

My uncle worked for the forestry commission in Scotland. They helped capture a Puma in the early 80s. They have caught a few Lynx as well.

I found it hard to believe that there are hordes of big cats roaming around. I do find it easier to believe that lots of big cats were turned loose after the Dangerous Animals act in the late 70s, interbred with the existing British wld cat population, and that there are some funny hybrids out there
 
Jon Dough said:
This bloke has written a book on British leopards 🙄 says there are around 500 mountain lion and 500 leopard living and breeding in the UK.
Click to expand...

He uses trail cams but hasn't filmed a live big cat, and when he did find what might have been a dead big cat he took one inconclusive photo of its smashed head, went away for two hours, and when he came back the carcass was gone.
 
Monty Pigeon said:
He uses trail cams but hasn't filmed a live big cat, and when he did find what might have been a dead big cat he took one inconclusive photo of its smashed head, went away for two hours, and when he came back the carcass was gone.
Click to expand...
The same guy has had aliens beam down to chat to him about the future of the world AND was in a newspaper earlier this year as a mountain lion was stalking him…….in Dorset 😂
 

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