Big cat sightings - Do you believe in them or have you seen any?

[Unknown2020]

So I’m fully prepared I may get told I’m crazy...

I live rurally, think fields backing onto each other, forests etc..

One day a few years back I was driving down a quiet country lane and in the distance I saw something black creeping along in the field amongst the corn growing. I actually came to a stop in a little lay by and watched thinking maybe it was a lost dog (nothing else about for miles, and not a typical walking area) On further watching it was definitely not a dog, it was like a cat but much bigger/longer and with a long tail and it moved about like a cat.

I mentioned it to a family member at the time and they said they were sure many years ago of seeing a puma that ran across in front of there car. Again too big to be a cat/too big to be a dog but moved like a cat.

Has anyone else actually spotted anything like this in the UK?

Myself and about 20 others saw one out the window of a rural Hampshire restaurant with extensive grounds, backing on to fields. Around 1986. Huge black cat, close enough to be no doubt it wasn't a normal cat.

Just because it was made illegal doesn't mean there haven't been idiots who have since smuggled big cats in to the country, as cubs, and then dumped them once they got too big too handle.

I was born late 70s, so any that had been released into the wild would be long dead now (or do they live 40+ years with no predators and ample food around?)

A lot of the reports here are from the 90s and early 00's - tail end (pardon the pun) of the 70s pets?

Anything more recent is unlikely to be a 2nd let alone 3rd generation and more likely to be the result of illegal smuggling. I would imagine anyway.

@LuluJakey1 I walk my dog near Trimdon, you've got me worried!

The one I saw was about 2012/13

@valentinevalentine - Sorry

I saw one when I was about 8. In a field out the back of our house. It was there long enough that I got my dad (a policeman so not prone to flights of fancy) and we looked at it with binoculars and I think dad reported it. They said it had likely escaped from a private zoo or been brought in as a baby and released.

• when I was eight was about 2002

My friend and I were riding through some woods in our teens, it was a favourite route and led to a field we always galloped across. Both ponies were as eager as ever to get to our racing path, prancing about and full of beans when they suddenly both stopped dead absolutely petrified. We didn't actually see anything in the 0.2 seconds before they both span round and galloped back off.

When we were back out from the woods and we could slow them down, both were trembling, sweating, and still showing the whites of their eyes. For context, both ponies were incredibly bold, been there and done it types that genuinely weren't bothered by anything at all, never before and never again after in their entire lives did either show fear like that or do anything resembling it. The next time we went that route they were a bit snorty but soon forgot about it, because they weren't the stressing type. It wasn't just nervous or silly ponies.

We couldn't work out what it was, because usual explanations didn't fit. Until a dog walker reported a sighting in a tree on our path just before we would have got there, and a farmer found the remains of a sheep. And the farmer really wasn't the type to make a mistake identifying a predator from a carcass.

Very large black cat, def not domestic cat, ran in front of my car while we were in very rural part of Scotland. It had a very long tail. Was around 6.30 in the morning and not quite daylight so had car lights on and got a really clear look at it.

I remember watching a programme ages ago about some guy who kept big cats in the uk (not sure if it was a sanctuary or something) and he said he had often found big cat footprints outside the enclosures, so he totally believed there were wild ones. I think he said they were puma prints.

@QuestionableMouse @valentinevalentine @AlviesMam
If it makes any difference it was a lane between Kelloe and Trimdon as I recall.

There's one near my mum, she and her neighbour have seen it.
One family gathering at my mum's, my aunt, my toddler and I went for a walk down the country lane it was dusk but spring/summer we were faced with something walking towards us that looked like a black cat we both said is that, then decided to pick the toddler up and walk back with my aunt walking backward watching it.
We've never really talked about it.

I wouldn't be surprised though I've seen a documentary about mountain lions and they are in people's gardens and they are oblivious apparently they don't get run over very often either maybe naturally timid?

My mum lives in one of the villages in Otmoor, Oxfordshire which is a world renowned nature reserve about 10 miles from Oxford. I wonder if they use the green corridors that are all around us, the UK is quite a green place even though we don't think that.

The one I saw in about 2002 was black. I was living in north Kent at the time, between bexleyheath and dartford.

I was on Castle Eden walkway. Same general area.

I was planning to go back once we're allowed out but maybe I'll give it a miss. 😂😂😂

I will preface this by saying that I know nowt about big cats... Would they attack a human or would they have to be provoked?

Great thread

Secret big cats capture the imagination, I think it is possible that some twit illegally buys one now and again and ends up releasing it/ escaping. But it must be quite a lonely life with no potential mate?

Although some domestic cats like Maine Coones can grow to an astonishing size, I wonder if some of the sightings are cats like those?

felicity I'm not an expert in the slightest, but even in countries where they live close to humans it's incredibly rare. And from what I've heard even then it's usually either unaccompanied very small children away from villages, or in famine/ desperation.

Over here neither scenario is relevant. And afaik most of the sightings in the uk are the smaller cats, at least in more recent decades.

From a logical pov it wouldn't make sense even for something as big as a leopard to be stalking large livestock, let alone humans, when there's an abundance of smaller prey with zero risk.

I saw a big black cat in rural Norfolk in 1996. I watched from an upstairs window as it walked and then began to run across the fields opposite a friends house early one morning.
It moved exactly like a cat but based on familiar items near it (and my distance from it) was a fair size.
My friend laughed. His Mum admitted privately that she had seen it previously but didn’t think she’d be believed. Several years later his Dad confessed to seeing it stalking the field at night.

I get that alive big cats can probably hide from humans but why has no one ever found a body of a dead one?

Anne they have - Kellas cats ... there’s at least one of them stuffed at Aberdeen University . They’re some sort of hybrid between domestic and wildcats . Black and quite big which probably explains some sightings although I remember when they were reporting cats up here they said they doubted it was Kellas cats ...

en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kellas_cat

Sorry - no idea how to do a clicky link ...

There was another found up the road in Inverness - but I think that was thought to be an escaped pet . That one’s also mounted somewhere and named Felicity .

Uh huh...

news.sky.com/story/police-officer-saw-big-cat-in-edinburgh-10356655

London, I saw one in London...I’m still not believed but I know what I saw. It was north London, so not central. Quite a busy large town though, but off a main road is a small winding road that leads out to a quieter part of the town with lots of fields surrounding. It was dark, I was driving down the long winding road, lots of fields either side when I had to slam on the breaks..I wasn’t going fast as it’s a very bendy road. I stopped and looked ahead and a huge black cat crossed the road walking in front of my car. The eyes reflected so bright and the tail...the tail was long and curled upwards...no doubt it was a huge wild cat like a Puma or something,

This was well over 15 years ago now, but as a teen I never done drugs or drink...still don’t, so it was never a case of something like that. I wasn’t belived but I was staring straight at it as it slowly walked across the road. I was so stunned I had a massively delayed reaction of grabbing my phone to take a photo.

I saw one about ten years ago. We were driving back from Ballater (near to where Charles was holed up). My DH was driving and I was in the passenger seat. I looked out the car window and about 100 yards away I saw this huge black cat about the size of a large dog. I shouted to DH to stop but there were cars behind us and we couldn’t. I knew it was a cat by the shape of its face and neck.

Ohh I love this kind of thing! About 7 maybe 8 years ago we were going on a family day trip and were all meeting at the edge of the village about 15 minutes from home, it was early on a Sunday morning around 8 ish so still really quiet on the roads etc and we pulled into the lay by to wait for the rest if the family and we saw a huge black cat in the field, I was really shocked as it was the first field from the edge of the village so not particularly rural but past there it is fields for a couple of miles so maybe just closer as its quiet, I really believe there are big cats but also doubtful ones released in the 70s would still be going but I guess they have their pick of small prey in uk countryside and theres definitely nothing above them in the food chain so it's a possibility, is there a possibility they may now be cross breeds with bigger domestic animals who have become lost?