A women has just knocked on the door & told me infront of my 3 children she found Puma sized prints in her garden.

[TheSleepFairy]

Thank fuck DD's don't know what a puma is!!!
Said negibour then went on about how huge they were & that she feared it was after her rabbits etc.

AIBU to think she is thoughless?

DD's are 8, 6 & 2 & currently think she found reindeer foot prints in her garden

paxo I don't believe we have a 3 legged puma roaming about but my neighbour obviously believed it enough to knock on my door & warn me & my 3 little girls that it might eat our cat.

DH is getting very pissed off that I am LOL'ing at the computer screen & not him.

(But BoF, just in case there is a bear in Merseyside, posters I saw in Canada had a nifty way to help you remember:

If it's black, fight back
If it's brown, stay down

HTH.)

They really really are TheHoneydragonsInTheIvy
[looking forward to lots of fun tomorrow]

That does help- thank you Blu

Btw a blown up rubber glove does excellent dragon prints if you haven't time to entice the genuine article

I'm not going out there with a blown up rubber glove! It's far too cold

I fret about that too BoF - I'm always in two minds as to whether to keep quiet and maybe see a bear (very exciting) or be noisy and scare all the bears away (because being too close to a bear woudl be very scary).

In practice we've only seen bears from the car except when we bumped into a couple on a walk with the cubs, and then the bears ran like blazes as the boys were very very noisy!

(although, on second thoughts, I might actually as that is a bloody good idea)

wimp

Nooka

... Being close to a bear would be scary

Coolest mumsnet understatement EVER, that was.

Love the rubber gloves idea.

Have Puma-type big cats round here, area is well known for them and DH and I saw one, several yards ahead of us on a footpath through a wood, a few years back. It was stock still and close enough to see what it was. Gave me the fear. And i like cats, just fat lazy useless articles like the ones snoring in front of my fire.....

puma ffs !
Didnt you tell her it was the abominable snow man ? .

.

pmsl @ rubber glove btw !

or perhaps she ment PUMA TRAINERS PRINTS ?

A favorite with the housebreakers round here .

conversation ?????

TSF -" Hi neighbour ! "

Neigbour - " hi . did you see the Puma prints in my garden ?"

TSF - " yeah , but to be honest , they look more like Nike`s to me ! "

Look you lot if there are reports in the news about strange animal prints in the snow up and down the country tomorrow I shall come on here and give you all a good telling off!

If all else fails OP , you could offer to leave out a dish of whiskers ? .

Pollyblue - whereabouts do you live??

Blu - that would not help sorry, I'd be asking it to stand still while I decided if it was dark brown or black - hmm, depends on the light really - shall I lay down or shout at you?? Hmmm

I thought you meant <a class="break-all" href="http://www.google.co.uk/imgres?imgurl=www.designer-sportswear.co.uk/images/puma-ferrari-trainers.jpg&imgrefurl=www.designer-sportswear.co.uk/puma.htm&usg=__RuBZfzpkD-yZMqfXltyzzfWadD4=&h=160&w=160&sz=5&hl=en&start=34&zoom=1&tbnid=I8Pj27qzYBobsM:&tbnh=125&tbnw=125&prev=/images%3Fq%3Dpuma%2Btrainers%26um%3D1%26hl%3Den%26sa%3DN%26biw%3D1024%26bih%3D677%26tbs%3Disch:10,1100&um=1&itbs=1&iact=hc&vpx=433&vpy=176&dur=354&hovh=125&hovw=125&tx=46&ty=84&ei=GPUPTc_QAoyQ4gbd8qSGAg&oei=__QPTbb3EY26hAfR9Jy5Dg&esq=3&page=3&ndsp=21&ved=1t:429,r:2,s:34&biw=1024&bih=677" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">these

I can't believe someone found a dead lynx once.

I thought that none of the released big cats had survived and all the sightings were late night doggers dog walkers.

ChippingIn I'm in Stroud, Glos. A right old hotbed for big cat sightings, there's been books written about them and all sorts.....

I didn't know it was a right old hotbed when we saw what we saw, had only just moved here (about 10 years ago). When we told friends they weren't impressed or bothered because sightings are ten a penny. I was a bit deflated by that...!

We saw a black panther at some distance from the road when driving in Norfolk in the summer a few years back. Our car was stuck in traffic, visibility was excellent, both husband and I saw it. We watched it for a couple of minutes. Can't remember what the road was but husband might as he remembers rubbish like where things are. Think it was either north or south of Brandon.

We told a few friends but nobody else because we thought anyone official would just ignore us or think we were complete loons. Have not seen any aliens yet and orifices are remarkably unprobed by any unknowns.

Ooh, good update from Nooka. I think the best advice on bears is quite nuanced depending on how you encounter them (see here). I was sort of thinking of the "Chancing on One in Your Garden Scenario"

I've been told by Alaskans that the standard advice for coping with Kodiak and Polar bears is to shoot on sight .

We have large reindeer that regularly walks across our extension roof accodring to dd2. Dd1 is yet to break the news that it is simply our cat, but the footprints look bigger where the snow has melted a little bit.

Well, I'm glad I didn't go out in the dead of night with a blown up rubber glove as it's been sodding well snowing here all day again.