Big cats likely?

my sister used to live in a village in exmoor and she always came up with the big cat storys, surely if there were so many big cats roaming the moors someone by now would have come up with conclusive proof,NESSIE springs to mind the shop by loch ness do pretty well out of it selling its nessie products.

Originally Posted by furrybean2002

Growing up round here you always heard stories about things like that. Another one was wallabies had been spotted and were living in the moores. You cant make it up can ya?

Yes wallabies are definitely living in the wild:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/A786477

And also there are hundreds of wild boars proliferating in England:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main...08/nboar08.xml

http://www.bigcats.org/esa/wildboar11.html


.

Originally Posted by svste

Call me mister cynical, but according to that story, there were ~2100 sightings in 15 months, but the map has 25 counties that all have 100+ sigtings(red ones) plus the rest, for the same time, those numbers don't seem to add up.

I think that the things are out there, I have seen interviews/pics of people who have been mauled and it definately wasn't tiddles.

Just thought I'd put the cat amongst the pigeons so to speak.

I am cynical too. Big time.

I do not think that every sighting of a big cat is a big cat. Perspective can be a tricky one.
I think that some of them are.

Look at say the number of the sightings near unused railway lines...
Either: People near railway lines are more prone to making things up / miss-seeing things
Or: Big cats like to saunter up and down these quiet patches of land, and are occaisionally seen.

I just dont buy the first option.

Then you have people being attacked once in a while. Maybe one or two people are a little bit mental. But, when you have a guy fighting a big dog sized cat off him, which is seen by the police, it just becomes more and more difficult to say they dont exist.

Logistically could they exist? Yes. With out any doubt at all. No question. There is *tons* of food, and more than enough room.

Is there enough of them to be a viable breeding population. Less likely, but, I would not at all say impossible.

Originally Posted by jonboy

Yes wallabies are definitely living in the wild:.

I used to be a roadie cyclist. I used to clock about 100 miles per day, usually alone, on back roads. Our bikes are very very quiet. I rode past on a jumpy thing (wallaby/kangaroo) one day. I was a bit spaced out at the time. (My brain sort of went into hiding when I was out on the raods...) It was a long time until I processed that info.

But, I saw it. It sort of swiveled its head a bit. Didnt really seem to bothered. I didnt even mention it to people very often, and when I did, other riders said they had seen them out and about as well.
We all just thought they were being farmed... and got loose or something.

We also saw... Ostriches. Those guys were in fields though. Ha ha.

Oh dear. Have I just lost whatever shred of credibility I have left.

Cant say that I've seen many big cats down my way...there certainly are a fair few big dogs and quite a lot of big birds (oo er missus)...the birds certainly more so around Maccy d's and BK

I see the occasional jaguar here in Shrewsbury. The people up the road have got one

I believe that there are big cats around. Never seen one, but the sightings are just too often for it to be hogwash.

Originally Posted by jonboy

And also there are hundreds of wild bores proliferating in SV650.org

Yep - and I'm one of 'em

.

[Messie]

eeerm - I've seen one!

Early dusk time, Essex/Suffolk border, I was out walking with a friend and her dogs. She'd told me before about how her (slightly dotty) mother had seen a big black cat a couple of times but they were very sceptical because she wasn't the most reliable of witnesses. Along a particularly quiet path running against a field the dogs suddenly froze and started sniffing the air. We looked to where they were pointing their noses and sure enough, there was a big black cat. And it was definately a cat - small head, long smooth back and long slightly bushy tail. I can't be certain but the closest type of cat it resembled was a panther. And it acted like a cat - saw us, *****ed up it's ears a bit, clocked the dogs and ran to cover. It was a truly amazing experience and strangely not at all frightening.

Interestingly I never knew about the close prximity of these sightings to disused railway tracks before I read this thread. But that area of Essex has many of them. Coincidence?
HTH

I can believe that wild big cat is more than a posiblility, here is Wales and in Scotland there loads of fresh food on the hoof.