Black Monk Posted April 16, 2017 #1 Share Posted April 16, 2017 A large, panther-like creature has been spotted by a mother and daughter prowling through the grass at a popular picnic spot. A mother and her teenage daughter were enjoying the sunshine at Crowcombe Park Gate, in Somerset's Quantock Hills, when she saw a 'big black' animal. The 32-year-old, who was with her 14-year-old daughter, said the sun was glinting off its fur as it skulked through the long grass metres in front. Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4415922/Panther-like-beast-spotted-Crowcombe-Park-Gate.html#ixzz4eQwqUZLI 7 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
NightScreams Posted April 16, 2017 #2 Share Posted April 16, 2017 Looks like Skeletor's cat mount. 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
oldrover Posted April 16, 2017 #3 Share Posted April 16, 2017 Looks a bit strange I admit, but I'm going for it being a mog. Easy way to resolve it to go back and measure the height of the grass it's moving alongside. 5 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Unusual Tournament Posted April 16, 2017 #4 Share Posted April 16, 2017 All these big cat sightings and no one attacked? Hmmm... 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
oldrover Posted April 16, 2017 #5 Share Posted April 16, 2017 8 minutes ago, Captain Risky said: All these big cat sightings and no one attacked? Hmmm... Ah but there was. A young boy in Wales surprised one of these 'big cats' and got a nasty scratch. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/wales/895643.stm So, it must be true, mustn't it? 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Unusual Tournament Posted April 16, 2017 #6 Share Posted April 16, 2017 (edited) 11 minutes ago, oldrover said: Ah but there was. A young boy in Wales surprised one of these 'big cats' and got a nasty scratch. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/wales/895643.stm So, it must be true, mustn't it? I clicked on the link you provided ( much appreciated), from the space between the scratch marks it's definately a large paw mark. Well larger than your average household cat. Edited April 16, 2017 by Captain Risky Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
oldrover Posted April 16, 2017 #7 Share Posted April 16, 2017 31 minutes ago, Captain Risky said: I clicked on the link you provided ( much appreciated), from the space between the scratch marks it's definately a large paw mark. Well larger than your average household cat. Or branch scratch. An injury from a big cat, especially a scared one, would probably have been horrendous. Plus, how on earth could a youngster have surprised one of these things? 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Unusual Tournament Posted April 16, 2017 #8 Share Posted April 16, 2017 2 hours ago, oldrover said: Or branch scratch. An injury from a big cat, especially a scared one, would probably have been horrendous. Plus, how on earth could a youngster have surprised one of these things? ...maybe a branch did scratch him after the cat startled him. Thou the scratch marks look far too even and well spaced out to have been branch marks.. But the boy did say he saw an oversized cat of some sorts. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
back to earth Posted April 16, 2017 #9 Share Posted April 16, 2017 19 minutes ago, Captain Risky said: ...maybe a branch did scratch him after the cat startled him. Only ' The Captain' could have come up with that one ! 19 minutes ago, Captain Risky said: Thou the scratch marks look far too even and well spaced out to have been branch marks.. But the boy did say he saw an oversized cat of some sorts. Man gets burned by UFO . A man in Dunnydoo got burned by a UFO last night ..... or maybe he just got too out of it dropped a cigarette in his lap . OR ... maybe he saw the Ufo and then dropped the cigarette in surprise ! 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
oldrover Posted April 17, 2017 #10 Share Posted April 17, 2017 1 hour ago, Captain Risky said: ...maybe a branch did scratch him after the cat startled him. Thou the scratch marks look far too even and well spaced out to have been branch marks.. But the boy did say he saw an oversized cat of some sorts. As regards the article, those are extremely minor scratches which would not have required any 'medical attention' other than possibly a little rub over with antiseptic. There is absolutely no evidence from the photo, which would be apparent,of any trauma, or force behind them, nor any sign of infection or inflamation. As I say, thus would be apparent. What we have here is evidence that the BBC, like any popular news outlet, will put out stories which are evidently just plain daft as long as they might relate to any 'mysterious' content, or generate interest outside of their usual demographic. It's nonsense I'm afraid/ very glad to say. 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Unusual Tournament Posted April 17, 2017 #11 Share Posted April 17, 2017 2 hours ago, oldrover said: As regards the article, those are extremely minor scratches which would not have required any 'medical attention' other than possibly a little rub over with antiseptic. There is absolutely no evidence from the photo, which would be apparent,of any trauma, or force behind them, nor any sign of infection or inflamation. As I say, thus would be apparent. What we have here is evidence that the BBC, like any popular news outlet, will put out stories which are evidently just plain daft as long as they might relate to any 'mysterious' content, or generate interest outside of their usual demographic. It's nonsense I'm afraid/ very glad to say. So big cats in the UK are a myth? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Unusual Tournament Posted April 17, 2017 #12 Share Posted April 17, 2017 4 hours ago, back to earth said: Only ' The Captain' could have come up with that one ! Man gets burned by UFO . A man in Dunnydoo got burned by a UFO last night ..... or maybe he just got too out of it dropped a cigarette in his lap . OR ... maybe he saw the Ufo and then dropped the cigarette in surprise ! You were nice and quiet... what happened... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Black Monk Posted April 17, 2017 Author #13 Share Posted April 17, 2017 12 hours ago, Captain Risky said: All these big cat sightings and no one attacked? Hmmm... How many big cat attacks are there each year in, say South America, with its big black cats? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
oldrover Posted April 17, 2017 #14 Share Posted April 17, 2017 6 hours ago, Captain Risky said: So big cats in the UK are a myth? Not entirely, there have been exotic cats recovered dead and alive from the British countryside. The largest of which was a puma. How they got there and how long they'd been there though is a different matter. Personally I've never seen any photograph which showed what the witnesses were claiming, a big cat, but it is possible that indavidual releases or escapees could be out there. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
acute Posted April 17, 2017 #15 Share Posted April 17, 2017 There have been many reports of Big Cats loose in Britain. There is nowhere on the British mainland that is truly isolated, because the place is too small. If an irresponsible owner wants to release a large cat into the wild (Maybe they obtained it illegally, or it has grown slightly!) there is notta lotta chance of it never being seen again. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
oldrover Posted April 17, 2017 #16 Share Posted April 17, 2017 2 hours ago, acute said: There have been many reports of Big Cats loose in Britain. There is nowhere on the British mainland that is truly isolated, because the place is too small. If an irresponsible owner wants to release a large cat into the wild (Maybe they obtained it illegally, or it has grown slightly!) there is notta lotta chance of it never being seen again. I'd argue that. Just to be clear though, I'm not advocating that there are, I've never seen anything that mkes me think there are feral big or exotic cats in the UK long term. But the chances of one remaining undetected if they were released is at least fairly high. There are sizeable areas of Britain with a very low population density, suitable to hide and sustain something as large as a leopard. But most cases where physical evidence has been recovered it's been of a relatively small species. Remember there are populations of small carnivores in the UK that remain undetected for decades at a time. Central and West Wales' pine martens for example. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Unusual Tournament Posted April 17, 2017 #17 Share Posted April 17, 2017 14 hours ago, Black Monk said: How many big cat attacks are there each year in, say South America, with its big black cats? How long is a piece of string? The thing is that the UK is highly urbanised and has a higher density of people than South America. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Unusual Tournament Posted April 17, 2017 #18 Share Posted April 17, 2017 12 hours ago, oldrover said: Not entirely, there have been exotic cats recovered dead and alive from the British countryside. The largest of which was a puma. How they got there and how long they'd been there though is a different matter. Personally I've never seen any photograph which showed what the witnesses were claiming, a big cat, but it is possible that indavidual releases or escapees could be out there. ...that's my point. If they're out there then it's possible that this particular boy was attacked by a big cat. Granted, it's not a full on attack but he saw something and there is no reason he shouldn't be given the benefit of the doubt. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
back to earth Posted April 17, 2017 #19 Share Posted April 17, 2017 19 hours ago, Captain Risky said: You were nice and quiet... what happened... I have never been 'nice and quiet ' . What happened was; you made a rather silly comment . 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Unusual Tournament Posted April 18, 2017 #20 Share Posted April 18, 2017 Father and son, 5, startled by two big cats near Welwyn Garden City The 37-year-old man, who wished to remain anonymous, was on a customary evening walk around Tewin with his five-year-old son about six weeks ago when the toddler excitedly pointed into the distance and asked what it was he could see. Standing in the open field about 400 metres away were two large “dusty, sandy coloured” big cats, coming to just below waist height, with long, dark tails. Startled, the observer said did not know what they were, but was “100 per cent” sure they were big cats from their movements. http://www.whtimes.co.uk/news/father-and-son-5-startled-by-two-big-cats-near-welwyn-garden-city-1-4941755 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
oldrover Posted April 18, 2017 #21 Share Posted April 18, 2017 15 hours ago, Captain Risky said: ..that's my point. If they're out there then it's possible that this particular boy was attacked by a big cat. Granted, it's not a full on attack but he saw something and there is no reason he shouldn't be given the benefit of the doubt. I strongly disagree, I see no reason to take this account seriously. A big/large cat seems to be among the least likely explanations for this (then) 11 year old's story. 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
oldrover Posted April 18, 2017 #22 Share Posted April 18, 2017 5 hours ago, Captain Risky said: Father and son, 5, startled by two big cats near Welwyn Garden City The 37-year-old man, who wished to remain anonymous, was on a customary evening walk around Tewin with his five-year-old son about six weeks ago when the toddler excitedly pointed into the distance and asked what it was he could see. Standing in the open field about 400 metres away were two large “dusty, sandy coloured” big cats, coming to just below waist height, with long, dark tails. Startled, the observer said did not know what they were, but was “100 per cent” sure they were big cats from their movements. http://www.whtimes.co.uk/news/father-and-son-5-startled-by-two-big-cats-near-welwyn-garden-city-1-4941755 Right, so the witness saw the cats at a distance of 400 meters. He also adds, “It was getting dark but you could see that it was something just not natural to the area.” So, at a dusk and over a distance of roughly four rugby fields, the witness was able to see that they were “dusty, sandy coloured” big cats, coming to just below waist height, with long, dark tails' and 'was "100% sure" they were big cats from their movements'. Then he goes on to say he saw them again, this time at only 200 meters, and in daylight. And he was able to make out the following detail, “They looked strange, with a bulbous face, this long snout, and big long tail - like a lion but not like a lion, but definitely a cat - you could tell that just by the way it was moving, like a domestic cat would.” At even 200 meters you can forget detail, neither of these accounts are possible to consider seriously. 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
papageorge1 Posted April 18, 2017 #23 Share Posted April 18, 2017 (edited) This bloody Yank has only vaguely heard about this before and now I have a bit of curiosity. I might need to hit the internet to get an idea of possible 'normal' and 'beyond the normal' theories as to what is going on. To start some chit-chat here, what is the most prevalent 'normal' and 'beyond the normal' theories for this phenomena? Edited April 18, 2017 by papageorge1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
oldrover Posted April 18, 2017 #24 Share Posted April 18, 2017 3 minutes ago, papageorge1 said: This bloody Yank has only vaguely heard about this before and now I have a bit of curiosity. I might need to hit the internet to get an idea of possible 'normal' and 'beyond the normal' theories as to what is going on. To start some chit-chat here, what is the most prevalent 'normal' and 'beyond the normal' theories for this phenomena? Well, the history of big cats (and by that I'm not just talking about the 'true' big cats or Pantherines, or large cats like pumas [which aren't taxonomically big cats], but any exotic non native species) being suspected of being at large in the British countryside has a long history. Darren Naish, Max Blake, and others published on a lynx shot in the wild in Devon in 1903, details here https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/tetrapod-zoology/edwardian-lynx-from-england/ There are other earlier examples I'm sure, but cats, mystery, or domestic are not my thing so I can't point to specific examples, but I'm sure I've got got a few half remembered references knocking about in my head somewhere. As a matter of interest Darren Naish is a publishing scientist, and does or did believe that the evidence for large cats living wild over here is persuasive. Here is an old article of his outlining his position, http://darrennaish.blogspot.co.uk/2006/02/british-big-cats-how-good-or-bad-is.html I don't know what the evidence he's citing is because as I say, this isn't my thing, but I do know that a live puma was trapped in Scotland, in the 80's, and was given the name Felicity for some reason. Here's a page that details this and some other cases http://scotcats.online.fr/abc/photoalbum/cannich.html I don't vouch for the website because I only skimmed through it. I also know of at least one leopard skull found (I think near or on Bodmin Moor, to which we will return, but again I have no idea if this was a publicity stunt). And that several exotic species have been shot across the British Isles over the years. The 'normal' theory for these hinges on releases/escapes of exotic pets. Back in the late 70's (78 I think) Mainland UK, IE Wales and England, not sure about Scotland, but definitely excluding Northern Ireland, passed the Dangerous Wild Animal Act. Essentially this regulated and licensed the private keeping of dangerous wild animals, pretty much what the name suggests really. In the aftermath of which there were/are widespread rumours that a lot of people released large cats into the wild here. Every once in a while a story crops up in the press confessing or accusing someone else of these releases. Before this it was a free for all, you really could buy a lion from Harrods if you wanted, and you weren't required to meet any particular requirement for keeping them, still can in N.I as I understand it, or you could until much later anyway. There's a photo I can never find of a young woman strolling down a London street with an adult tiger on a dog lead. Things had to change. There are stories of big cats loose over here from pretty much everywhere, in my country we have lots of places which we abbreviate to 'Bont', and just about every one of them has it's own 'beast of Bont'. My ex wife was convinced that her kitten was decapitated by her local mystery felid, the 'beast of Tonmawr'. See what I mean, they are everywhere but the most famous examples are the Surrey Puma (before my time), and the mega stars of the British big cat firmament the 'Beast of Bodmin Moor', and the 'Beast of Exmoor' (also before my time really). To be honest I'm not sure if they're supposed to be the same cat or different animals. In 1983 the government sent a detachment of Royal Marines to shoot the beast. They did not, in fact they didn't fire a single round, but apparently some of them claimed to have seen it. My favourite story from this hunt was that one concerned local daubed 'DOG' in luminous paint on their Labrador before letting it out at night. I've seen more photographic evidence, stills and footage, from an array of witnesses, police included, and have never seen a single frame that stood up. As an aside another ex of mine had a brother who had his neighbourhood swarming with armed police after he was chased home by a lion (Old English Sheepdog), in his defense there was a circus in town about half a mile away and they did have lions. That's the 'normal', the 'not so normal' goes in two directions that I'm aware of firstly, there's the like of 'Cat Country' author Di Francis. She claims that the animals are not exotic escapees, but a previously uncatalogued species of British big cat. Too stupid to comment on any further. Francis' book is noteable for two things, firstly she shows the ex-spouse kitten beheading beast of Tonmawr in a full colour photo, it's a tabby cat. But after that Francis does something nasty. A little girl disappeared somewhere in England, and despite the family asking her not to, she included this in her book and claimed the child was taken by one of her cats. Later of course the real creature that took the child confessed, and that was that. Nice one Di Francis, bet the family enjoyed you doing that. The other direction it goes in is toward the 'black dog' zooform traditions we have over here, as in a more supernatural, elemental type phenomena. I utterly reject this totally, but as it happens I did see such a thing once, a huge black cat the size of a horse at least running across the skyline one new year's eve in the early 80's. I can still see it now. Except of course I never saw any such thing, but I still have the childhood memory of doing so. 3 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Unusual Tournament Posted April 18, 2017 #25 Share Posted April 18, 2017 (edited) 3 hours ago, oldrover said: Right, so the witness saw the cats at a distance of 400 meters. He also adds, “It was getting dark but you could see that it was something just not natural to the area.” So, at a dusk and over a distance of roughly four rugby fields, the witness was able to see that they were “dusty, sandy coloured” big cats, coming to just below waist height, with long, dark tails' and 'was "100% sure" they were big cats from their movements'. Then he goes on to say he saw them again, this time at only 200 meters, and in daylight. And he was able to make out the following detail, “They looked strange, with a bulbous face, this long snout, and big long tail - like a lion but not like a lion, but definitely a cat - you could tell that just by the way it was moving, like a domestic cat would.” At even 200 meters you can forget detail, neither of these accounts are possible to consider seriously. You've contradicted yourself. In post 14 you allude to the fact that it's probable that big cats are in rural and semi rural Britain... and now you're questioning the validity of the first hand eye witness. If big cats are out there then people will eventually see them and have close encounters. Edited April 18, 2017 by Captain Risky Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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