Big Cat

[Hamster]

The Asiatic Cheetah is an endangered species, a few still survive in Iran and despite highly active protection programmes which include habitat preservation suffer routine losses on the roads !! If a Cheetah can't dodge a car on such vast roads I'm pretty damn sure a leopard/cougar/lynx would have no trouble getting hit by a car in the tiny twisty country roads of Britain.

[achosenman]

The trouble with all the wild claims is they offer no proof. Why should a persons partial sighting and subsequent interpretation be accepted at face value? Especially when rational objective evidence indicates otherwise? It is for those making the claim to back up their story, not the other way around.

 

Why no camera traps? Trail cams are readily available these days. I use them to catch poachers, vandals and fly tippers. If a farmer thinks he is losing lambs to a big cat my first action would be to place trail camera's and get the offending animal identified or shoot it if it's the more likely fox or dog variety of cat

 

Whats all this about red eye shine? It seems to me to be yet more "city boy" ignorance.

 

 

 

Eyeshine is a visible effect of the tapetum lucidum. When light shines into the eye of an animal having a tapetum lucidum, the pupil appears to glow. Eyeshine can be seen in many animals, in nature and in flash photographs. In low light, a hand-held flashlight is sufficient to produce eyeshine that is highly visible to humans (despite our inferior night vision); this technique, spotlighting, is used by naturalists and hunters to search for animals at night. Eyeshine occurs in a wide variety of colors including white, blue, green, yellow, pink and red. However, since eyeshine is a type of iridescence, the color varies with the angle at which it is seen and the minerals which make up the reflective tapetum-lucidum crystals.

White eyeshine occurs in many fish, especially walleye; blue eyeshine occurs in many mammals such as horses; green eyeshine occurs in mammals such as cats, dogs, and raccoons; and red eyeshine occurs in coyote, rodents, opossums and birds

 

In the US they don't seem to have trouble hunting cats with dogs, yet strangely we in the UK don'e seem capable. I've hunted in countries with big cat populations, they leave plenty of sign because cats are territorial.

 

There is so much thermal equipment and night vision in use today yet strangely not a single sighting...go figure.

[Prospero]

I live in Sussex. There are plenty of mink around, but I have never seen a dead one on the road.

 

So, if there a jysr a few big cats around, likely you won't see them on the road either.

 

Lack of proof doesn't equal proof of lack.

[Mochastorm]

My own opinion is that there is insufficient evidence to prove the existence of big cats roaming the British countryside. There are no pug marks, droppings, or corpses. There have been the remains of prey animals which have allegedly been killed by a big cat. The predators usually identified as dogs with later feeding by scavengers and carrion feeders. A big cat will leave its DNA all over a kill. They lick it and leave their saliva all over it. With that as evidence you could deduce the species and the sex. The sightings are nearly always of black leopards or Jaguars which are rarer in the wild than their naturally occurring non melanistic cousins. It amazes me that naturalists can find the rarest of the big cats in vast areas of forest, mountain ranges and desert. These areas are often almost the size of this country with tiny human populations. We can't photograph a black panther roaming the fields of this heavily populated island where everyone from the age of seven upward carries a camera. I am open to have my opinion changed, but only with evidence.

[panoma1]

I don't really care what the naysayers say.........it's up to the individual to decide whether to accept the claims or not, I know what I saw! And that cannot and will not change!

[Hendrix's rifle]

I don't really care what the naysayers say.........it's up to the individual to decide whether to accept the claims or not, I know what I saw! And that cannot and will not change!

+1

[Hamster]

The trouble with all the wild claims is they offer no proof. Why should a persons partial sighting and subsequent interpretation be accepted at face value? Especially when rational objective evidence indicates otherwise? It is for those making the claim to back up their story, not the other way around.

 

Why no camera traps? Trail cams are readily available these days. I use them to catch poachers, vandals and fly tippers. If a farmer thinks he is losing lambs to a big cat my first action would be to place trail camera's and get the offending animal identified or shoot it if it's the more likely fox or dog variety of cat

 

Whats all this about red eye shine? It seems to me to be yet more "city boy" ignorance.

 

 

In the US they don't seem to have trouble hunting cats with dogs, yet strangely we in the UK don'e seem capable. I've hunted in countries with big cat populations, they leave plenty of sign because cats are territorial.

 

There is so much thermal equipment and night vision in use today yet strangely not a single sighting...go figure.

 

You had me right there.

 

I live in Sussex. There are plenty of mink around, but I have never seen a dead one on the road.

 

So, if there a jysr a few big cats around, likely you won't see them on the road either.

 

Lack of proof doesn't equal proof of lack.

 

Actually lack of proof does exactly that otherwise why doubt three legged trout just because you've never seen one !

[inthedark]

 

You had me right there.

 

 

Actually lack of proof does exactly that otherwise why doubt three legged trout just because you've never seen one !

 

Aha, ye may be prone to mock, but there's a two legged trout just up the street from me so a three legged one is just one step beyond

[norfolk dumpling]

Panoma1 - my brother in law worked on the large farm where Lynx was shot and he saw corpse. He's a sensible chap so yes certain this happened. I accept if there was one about there might be others but when this occurred it was strongly suspected it was an escapee. Wasn't there a dangerous animals act around that time that might also have put a few out into the wild but not in big numbers where there could be breeding?

[Prospero]

Actually that is a completely silly argument. You can't prove God exist's, but because you can't, that proves he doesn't? Nonsense.

[bruno22rf]

Freely admit to laughing at those who claim to have seen large Cats roaming our countryside then last year, along the single track Berryfields road just outside Aylesbury, I saw a Cat about the size of a Cocker Spaniel crossing the lane in broad daylight. I had a totally clear view of it for about 4 or 5 seconds before it slipped into the hedge. Far too small to be a BIG cat but I have never seen a Cat that size before.

[old man]

Freely admit to laughing at those who claim to have seen large Cats roaming our countryside then last year, along the single track Berryfields road just outside Aylesbury, I saw a Cat about the size of a Cocker Spaniel crossing the lane in broad daylight. I had a totally clear view of it for about 4 or 5 seconds before it slipped into the hedge. Far too small to be a BIG cat but I have never seen a Cat that size before.

Just an F1 hybrid savannah cat?

[Hamster]

Freely admit to laughing at those who claim to have seen large Cats roaming our countryside then last year, along the single track Berryfields road just outside Aylesbury, I saw a Cat about the size of a Cocker Spaniel crossing the lane in broad daylight. I had a totally clear view of it for about 4 or 5 seconds before it slipped into the hedge. Far too small to be a BIG cat but I have never seen a Cat that size before.

 

What colour was it ? There are several large breeds of domestic cats.

[Penelope]

A very good documentary, and one that came to mind whilst reading this thread. All about how leopards live in very close proximity to humans in India.

 

I like that Prospero, I once made my dad stop near Warrington a long time ago picked up a dead pine martin took it home and buried it but I never seen a dead mink what about otters?

I recorded a program off BBC 4 couple of weeks ago leopards 21st century cats started watching it but turned it off as it wasn't really kid friendly but very interesting showing things I've never seen before very worth a look.

[wymberley]

Big cats - forget it - old news.

It's now wallabies down here.

[Mice!]

I finally got to watch the documentary the other night and it was very good.

 

Can easily see how big cats would avoid being seen, but given how many folk have night vision and thermal gear these days I think they are probably a thing of the past now in this country, unless people are just keeping quiet about what they see.

[Hendrix's rifle]

I finally got to watch the documentary the other night and it was very good.

 

Can easily see how big cats would avoid being seen, but given how many folk have night vision and thermal gear these days I think they are probably a thing of the past now in this country, unless people are just keeping quiet about what they see.

In fairness after some responses on here people will keep quiet to stop them being ridiculed

[Hamster]

They can hide all they like but they still gotta poo.

[Mice!]

My thinking is either people keep quiet because they don't want the area flooded with other folk looking for them, or people aren't seeing them anymore.

 

Like hamster says they got to poop and leave foot prints so where are they?

[spandit]

They can hide all they like but they still gotta poo.

My dogs have been pooing on my land for 3 years now and it's not knee deep in the stuff - gets eaten by slugs very quickly. Despite Hitchens Razor "What can be asserted without evidence can be dismissed without evidence" I choose to believe big cats could be out there. Not going to use my belief to blow up any big cat infidels mind...

[vampire]

A very good documentary, and one that came to mind whilst reading this thread. All about how leopards live in very close proximity to humans in India.

 

Watched that some time ago,were they in back gardens etc looking for pets.

[Vince Green]

Big cats in the wild were an absolute fact thirty plus years ago, we know how they got there. The farmers knew it, the game keepers knew it, the police knew it and the Ministry of Ag knew it.
It was dealt with discreetly because they didn't want to spread alarm. Its a non story, why does it keep coming up like its akin to UFOs and the Loch Ness monster?

The government simply got it wrong by suddenly banning something without giving owners a way out, and they preferred to cover it up because it was them that screwed up.

Do they still exist today? Well not round here, but I think the evidence is clear that in some places they have survived

Edited May 10, 2017 by Vince Green

[norfolk dumpling]

Vince Green - I think you are quite correct. There were a few - the Lynx killed in Norfolk 35-40 yrs ago was probably one of the last. There was also good stories - confirmed by a local vet - of a North American mountain lion seen several times on a big, heavily keepered estate which eventually disappeared! Today with our vast population, wide access to countryside and technology I could not see anything like this surviving without being spotted.

[Penelope]

Taking street dogs and pigs, and a few people too.

 

Watched that some time ago,were they in back gardens etc looking for pets.

[Mice!]

It was interesting that where they were left alone with marked out territories they pretty much kept out of the way, watching them with the thermal camera sneaking away past people, one area said there were thousands of feral dogs which the leopards took as they pleased, some dogs wearing spiked collars as protection, dogs start barking look out.

 

In heavily hunted areas where game was scarce and the leopards shot or captured and relocated these where the areas with the worst problems, so a few bid cats in the British country side it would probably seem like paradise for them.