I’d always had these things down as total tosh but something slunk / jogged across the bridleway about here – the bridleway running along the edge of the forest / field boundary. It just moved wrong for a dog, fox, kitty cat. Kind of a dark tan colour with black running along its back end to tail. As with all the great ‘hoax’ could it be sightings I didnt see its head. This all happened about 19:15ish Saturday night. Done a bit of googling and cant find anything obvious for the area to suggest a local myth thing going on.

Muntjac 🙂

there’s been a big cat in hertfordshire for yonks. been seen loads

I seen a dead Muntjac by the dside of the road yesterday. quite upsetting. 🙁 Lovely little creatures they are. They’ve got them in Epping Forest.

There are meant to be big cats all over the country aren’t there? I saw one in Gloucestershire a few years ago.

I never thought of them as tosh. Some unidentified animal in the woods – seems perfectly reasonable to me. Mysterious undiscovered large species would be tosh, but an escaped pet or other non-native animal is realistic.

here kity kity

There was a load of sightings around Halifax earlier in the year…

Not munjac.

Tosh may be a bit harsh but its the best way to convey I’m not given to making this type of stuff up. I was a little suprised to see something I think falls into the unexplained large animal sighting side of the things. Also rather typically it was a suitably sketchy sighting. Now done a bit more googling and there was a sighting of something to the East of Edwinstowe by a person walking to Ollerton.

Some very good time ago a friend of mine saw one in Wyre Forest, just up from the ford, at Five Ways (we called it Five Ways).
He was out for a walk with his g/f. Gave them a right fright.
Apparently they informed plod who said they occasionally get reports of a similar nature but didn’t want to make too much of a fuss about it in case they end up with nutters roaming around the forest, with guns.
Well, at least they prevented the guns bit. 😀

[video]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vQYrszfSbUE[/video]

If they can survive on the west coast of Scotland…

geeees i would royaly shit myself if i came across that on the trail 😯

Its all tosh, no-one has ever found a skeleton of a dead one, they can’t live forever? There was a lot of investigation locally here in Devon, and they found paw prints, but they natural history museum proved they were from a dead animal as there was no spread, and the prints of the left and right were exactly the same..

I didnt fancy sticking my head in the undergrowth to look for tracks.

If the natural history museum proved that they were from a dead animal that must mean….. it was a ZOMBIE BIG CAT! CHRIST! Get my big gun with the silver decapitation bullets! 🙂

It was heading off towards the longhorn enclosures – my money would be on the cows so proof might turn up.

If I’d seen its head, looked for tracks or just seen it for longer I’d be completely convinced. The way it moved fits more with the video above but the tail was down – kind of a long low arc. There are lots of sighting of these things. I can’t believe they are all real. There is also the lack of evidence. If I’m correct and the person who blogged about a sighting a couple of years ago is correct how come no one else has seen a big cat kicking about – its hardly a place devoid of people.

Well ok they postualted it was dead and no on disagreed..

The lack of bodies is a problem in all these big cat sightings, but your description sounds dead like a Puma/Cougar – colour, stripe and low tail carry sound right.

slainte 😯 rob

Great! My wife didn’t want to go to whistler because of bears and cougars. Now I’ll not be about to get her to sherwood pines either.

@toys19: In the Victorian era, many hoaxes were thought up by desperate men trying to prove that evolution was a credible theory. They made fools of themselves & were of course caught. This does not mean that evolution is not happening though.

Big cats in the British Isles are a fact. (Educated opinion).

rob, I’m open minded about it, but there has been as much proof for a big cat as there has been for the loch ness monster.

The colour and coat texture looks right, as does the black banding down the back.

Its all tosh, no-one has ever found a skeleton of a dead one

Would you, though? If there aren’t many around and they slink off into a corner to die (like normal cats do) it wouldn’t be that surprising if nobody’s found a dead one.

how often do you find capybara skeletons in the UK and yet they exist in Norfolk

or wallaby skeletons in peak district

its not often you see skeletons for anything really…

if you think about how many wild animals / birds there are… compared to how many skeletons you actually see… where do they all vanish to? 😉

That’s scary. Have you told anyone in authority?

Skeletons just don’t survive in the wild as you imagine they might.
The body gets eaten up and the bones scatered etc.

Have you told anyone in authority?

Its a case of who do you report it to. There seems to be various big cat watch groups on the web but none seem current. Natural England has been keeping info on sightings. Police wildlife officer seems a reasonable place to start.

Since I’ve been doing a bit more digging about UK sightings. There are some claims that a skull has been found in the UK.

I had wondered what it could be eating as its an arable area but its a forest so there must be a fair amount of deer.

plenty of prey species around. Rabbits mainly I would guess.

Most big cats will eat rabbit sized things and the like rather than full on deer

There were claims of a sighting of a big cat type creature in Clumber Park (my local riding spot) some years ago – which isn’t too far away from Sherwood Pines , though I’ll admit there is a lot of open ground in between!

Edit – 2003 article on local rag website – http://www.worksopguardian.co.uk/news/local-news/just_what_did_couple_see_1_637007

I saw one as well about 6-8 years ago crossing the road as I was driving from taunton to glastonbury. Same as you not quite close enough to make it out for sure but it was the way it moved, nothing like a dog, deer etc. Been a few sightings the south side of bristol as well.

I think I heard that about the wallabys a short while ago, there are areas all over the country where they are wild?

We have a pretty significant population of cougar here in New Mexico and a couple have been killed right in Albuquerque this year when hit by cars. THe typical N. American cougar/mountain lion doesn’t have a definitive dark stripe down their tail (although young kittens have some darker markings), but I don’t know if their are similar European species that do. In 40 years of hiking and biking in the mountains of the western US, I have seen only 2 cougars—of course the adage here is it is the one you don’t see you have to worry about.
There was a guy here in New MExico killed last year by one. He was taking a bath in a mountain stream and became lunch. THey have mountain lion warning signs at most trailheads in the state.

FOrgot to add, but N. American cougar do have a black tip on their tail

That’s scary. Have you told anyone in authority?

Err, stw is THE authority……

😉

toys19 – Member
rob, I’m open minded about it, but there has been as much proof for a big cat as there has been for the loch ness monster

I have no strong opinion either way TBH (although ill-thought-through logic suggests there are likely escaped to be big cats out there somewhere), it’s just that the OP’s description sounded like one of those to me.

slainte 🙂 rob

Dangerous Animals act (or something like that) in the 70s prohibited the private ownership of large cats etc. Many were released into the wild rather than be shot. Plenty of ’em about I reckon and pretty sure I’ve seen one run about 30 foot in front of me whilst out at dusk on my tod. Well, it wasn’t a dog or a deer or a wallaby or a gruffalo, it was very quick and very quiet and a had long tail.

During one night ride myself and my mates head torches picked out some eyes belonging to something large that decided to start moving towards us through the woods. We didn’t stop to find out. Oh, and then there are the claw marks…

Strangely enough being the person who saw it I’m not 100% convinced. I’d only be that if I’d seen the whole animal. Covering up the head / shoulder of the animal in colournoise’s picture gives a fair approximation of what I saw. Although I was looking broadside.

There was a big change in the law in the mid 1970’s where the requirements for keeping big cats became more onerous. You could buy them at Harrods! It wouldn’t be improbable that some got dumped but that was over 25 years ago.

I could see big cats avoiding detection. Foxes going to be more common but you don’t see too many of them when just out for a ride, same goes for badgers and otters.

+1 dans160

I’d bet on the likelihood of the sightings being large cats being released into the wild. Always have been amazed that an individual would want a large, carnivorous cat as a pet. We have, over the years, had a similar problem with people wanting wolf hi-breds (7/8 wolf, 1/8 dog) and then finding out they have a very large (150+ lb) agressive animal to deal with.

Is this the latest effort to try and make Sherwood Pines a worthwhile ride? Simply by adding big cats? 🙂

I totally believe you though OP. Fairly sure I’ve seen a black one myself a few years back, and a mate’s brother swears blind he saw one in the car headlights with a fox in its mouth!