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DNA confirms there IS a big cat roaming the British countryside
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- Almondsetat 2y agoUnless those big cats were dispersed in >5 numbers in the same area how are they supposed to reproduce? This problem will just solve itself in a couple of (cat) years
- dotancohen 2y agoThe problem may no longer exist in a few years, but children used to playing in a deemed-safe countryside might be at risk in the meantime.
- jamesu 2y agoThe groups far more likely at risk from being attacked by big cats roaming the countryside would be ramblers and dog walkers, especially older folk.
- hnlmorg 2y agoI think we are long past the era when kids would run off for miles into the countryside, unaccompanied by an adult. Plus if it did have a taste for humans, we’d already have reports of people being attacked by now. So if there is a big cat, and that’s a big “if”, then it’s more likely the cat is at risk from farmers shooting a predictor to the farm’s livestock, than kids are at risk from the cat
- dotancohen 2y ago> I think we are long past the era when kids would run off for miles into the countryside, unaccompanied by an adult. That's horrible. In my country it is still possible. Maybe not "miles" into the field, but a few hundred meters, sure.
- hnlmorg 2y agoThe different between a few hundred meters and a few miles is pretty darn significant. A literal order of magnitude in fact
- hi-v-rocknroll 2y agoAt 13, I regularly solitarily ventured about 15 miles away (5 miles as the crow flies) by bicycle.
- hnlmorg 2y agoAnd how many years ago was that? I used to venture far when I was 13. Times are different now
- hi-v-rocknroll 2y agoI'll take a wild guess that kids in rural Kenya venture quite far when there is no other form of transportation.
- tasuki 2y agoChildren are at risk by cars, not cats...
- hi-v-rocknroll 2y agoI believe this to be true. I remember some college or high school age people drove an old VW Beetle within an inch of my rear tire in the bike lane, honked repeated, and thought it would be funny if I fell and they ran me over.
- bobcostas55 2y agoNature, uh, finds a way.
- peutetre 2y agoKeep absolutely still. Its vision is based on movement: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W85oD8FEF78 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W85oD8FEF78
- throwaway38375 2y agoIt would appear this is not the first bit of evidence suggesting that Alien Big Cats (ABCs) are a real thing. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_big_cats#Proven_captures_and_remains https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_big_cats#Proven_captur... I should add, the "Alien" in ABC denotes alien to the country they were found in. Not alien to planet Earth! :)
- doublerabbit 2y agoI'm in favour of an apocalypse caused by a swarm of giant alien murder cats rather than the cliche skynet outcome.
- surfingdino 2y agoI can imagine them climbing on top of cathedrals or tower apartment blocks and curling up on the roofs to soak in the sunlight while the buildings precariously creak under the cats' weight and eventually collapse. The giant cats unfazed move to the next cathedral ... that would be a very British giant cat apocalypse.
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- nashashmi 2y agoTo get people to accept a monster, show them a bigger monster. While we let AI take over, we will rest easy it won’t be as bad as skynet.
- Cthulhu_ 2y agoPlanet of the Apes but swap out apes with murder kittens.
- scarygliders 2y agoEasily distracted by giant balls of knitting wool ;) Their one Achilles Heel.
- moffkalast 2y agoA leopard? In Britain? It probably escaped from the zoo.
- thejohnconway 2y agoIllegal exotic pets, more likely.
- throwaway38375 2y agoThis is one of the most likely theories IMHO. A lot of sightings started at the end of the 70s, which would align with the introduction of this law: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dangerous_Wild_Animals_Act_1976 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dangerous_Wild_Animals_Act_197... Rumour has it that lots of wealthy people simply released their "pets" into the wild rather than confirming with the laws! Fairly certain there were documented cases of servants confirming this too.
- masklinn 2y agoA private collection seems more likely, unless it was a zoo closure and the zookeepers got fired before it was wound down a zoo would most likely alert the government.
- moffkalast 2y agoMaybe it's two blokes in a leopard costume.
- zeristor 2y agoI wonder how many lynx there are in the countryside. They’re not as charismatic, but they are native, and would be handy in regrowing native woodlands in Scotland.
- Cthulhu_ 2y agoNot as charismatic? Have you seen their absolute paws?
- thaumasiotes 2y ago> Rick Minter, who has received more than 1,000 reports of people’s encounters with big cats, said the animal was most likely to have been a leopard. > Of the five species in the Panthera genus – lion, leopard, tiger, jaguar and snow leopard – the only other cat that has a similar melanistic form is the jaguar, and they don’t appear to be in the British countryside, he added. I'm failing to see why that's an argument that favors leopards over jaguars.
- davidvaughan 2y agoI confess to some scepticism. The lady concerned seems to be a dedicated big cat believer, with seven sightings already[0]. If other witnesses had been present, I would be more accepting of the claim. [0] https://www.newsandstar.co.uk/news/19808796.cumbrias-sharon-larkin-snowden-big-cats-there/ https://www.newsandstar.co.uk/news/19808796.cumbrias-sharon-...
- phpnode 2y agoAgree, it reminds me a bit of the guy who was really obsessed by the mh370 mystery and happens to have found more pieces of the plane than anyone else. It’s certainly possible, but I remain skeptical
- dralley 2y agoI mean, several of those parts has matching serial numbers with the corresponding parts installed on MH-370. I'm not sure how one could fake that without a lot of nonpublic information. And didn't the dude in question walk along the entire coastline of Madagascar looking for washed up debris? That's certainly a plausible reason to find them.
- dnh44 2y agoMy partner has seen them twice from close up (<10m), in the Cambridgeshire area. But this was in the late 90’s.
- MarcScott 2y agoIsn't that a little like saying archaeologists seem to find a suspiciously large number of historical objects, or tornado hunters seem to have a suspiciously large number of tornado sightings?
- GreenWatermelon 2y agoI think the problem os being only a single witness claiming to have sighted them? The Loch Ness monster has more reported sightings, so a single witness, imo, is not enough to say with a large degree of certainty that there is a big cat roaming around.
- throwaway38375 2y agoA couple more noteworthy examples: https://metro.co.uk/2024/05/14/big-cat-hunters-have-proof-running-wild-uk-20831525/ https://metro.co.uk/2024/05/14/big-cat-hunters-have-proof-ru... https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/feb/22/it-was-a-big-cat-claimed-cumbrian-leopard-sighting-fails-to-convince-experts https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/feb/22/it-was-a-big-c... My apologies for the abysmal UK news websites!
- cal85 2y agoBit shoddy to make a categorical claim in the headline, when the immediate next line basically says "Or maybe not?"
- eggy 2y agoIt's the Cat People! Just ask Nastassia Kinski <cue David Bowie singing>
- 082349872349872 2y agoI preferred The Hunger (1983): Bowie/Deneuve/Sarandon
- eggy 2y agoMe too, but I had a thing for Nastassia then when I was 18. Later, finding out how she was exploited by Polanski and others, I felt so bad for her. Hollywood is a dark place. I liked Tess, since I had read the Thomas Hardy novel in high school before seeing the film.
- 082349872349872 2y agoI have no idea how much limited editions of Dame ONJ AC DBE in sweatband and leg warmers may be going for (and not that my room at 18 were ever decorated in this manner), but were you still to have a thing for Nastassja, each of the few hundred Avedon portraits seem to very roughly be going for ~$64k.
- MarcScott 2y agoIt wouldn't surprise me if there were a large enough population in the UK to be sustainable. I've been hearing stories about black leopard sightings since I was a kid, and geographically they are quite far apart. These animals are pretty shy and mostly hunt at night. It was only recently that we managed to obtain footage of them hunting at night in an area of the world where they are fairly common. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/science-environment-68665332 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/science-environment-68665332
- helsinkiandrew 2y agoIt's very unlikely any unreported big cats have escaped into the UK countryside since the late 1970s (when the Dangerous Wild Animals act basically outlawed them as pets and some owners let them loose in the wild). It would be quite amazing for there to be enough animals to maintain a mating population of atleast 3 or 4 generations since then without them being seen much more frequently.
- dnh44 2y agoMy partner has had two (very) close up sightings and she said sightings among her peer group were common enough that no one thought it was that big a deal. This was in the late 90’s though. There are certainly enough sheep and rabbits in the English countryside to support a small population of big cats.
- desas 2y agoDo Panthers carry off their prey to eat? It seems surprising that there aren't regular reports of farmers finding sheep that have been half-eaten.
- Anarch157a 2y agoWhat species of panther ? Leopards definetly do, they even drag carcasses up trees. Lions, Tigers and Jaguars usually eat in place.
- oliwarner 2y agoBut they are reported quite frequently. I live in East Anglia and there is at least one sighting every couple of years, often with significantly blurry photo evidence of a dark, pantherine animal, 100m+ away. It's relegated to the "and finally" segment of local news. I don't think I believe it either but the British countryside is vast, well stocked. An animal like this could evade human contact if it wanted.
- novaleaf 2y ago
- giantg2 2y agoThis is a lot like the western mountain lion in the eastern US. People say they see them or hear them but there never seems to be any hard evidence. The theory is that the eastern mountain lion is extinct and any possible mountain lion is escaped from captivity or has traveled from the western states. (FL has a panther population, but that is a different distinct subspecies). It would be interesting if the DNA is not a hoax and they eventually find the animal and it's origin.
- boomboomsubban 2y agoHaving lived near mountain lions, it was hard to believe any could be hidden given how loud they are. Looking it up, their roars seem associated with mating or territory battles, so if there were only one it's possible it'd be quiet.
- giantg2 2y agoSome of the reports I know of were around a captive lion. They said they could hear other lions calling (or responding) to the captive one.
- boomboomsubban 2y agoThat seems like a scenario where it'd be very easy to collect evidence, though looking it up there are numerous confirmed sightings in Eastern states so they probably did set up a recorder.
- giantg2 2y agoThe one about the calling was a long time ago, before cheap digital recording would allow. Most of the sightings these days are people misidentifying other animals (bobcats, house cats, etc). A few turnbout to be real but are escaped or migrated from the western states or Canada. I think the last true eastern lion was in the 1930s in Maine or something.
- TomMasz 2y agoThis is a potential problem in any country where people can get away with illegally obtaining wild animals as "pets". They're cute and manageable when they're young but the time will come when they're full-grown and it's easier to just release them than admit to the authorities you've been harboring a dangerous wild animal.
- api 2y agoMy sister in law saw a mountain lion a few years ago where she lives in suburban Pittsburgh. They supposedly are not there according to the state. They’ve also been seen in Ohio, Kentucky, etc. where authorities claim they no longer exist. These animals are incredibly stealthy. Do a web search for “can you spot the mountain lion” or similar things and you’ll find a lot of photos where it will take you minutes to find one. Saw one a few years back of a woman taking a selfie getting photobombed by one that couldn’t have been more than ten feet behind her. Could barely see it. Luckily they rarely attack humans.
- jjgreen 2y agoSheffield, a city with a lot of terraced housing, is particularly prone to "big cat scares", the usual story being that it moves around in the roof-spaces of the adjoined terraces. I lived next door to a lovely little old lady who was convinced that the noises in her attic were from an errant leopard rather than a pigeon.
- switch007 2y agoThat's hilarious. Have they checked there's not something in the environment turning people mad? Is it even common for terraced houses to share roof space without a dividing wall??
- jjgreen 2y agoThey tend to be built in 4s, with a covered alleyway between the two middle ones (a "gennel" in local parlance), the roof ends have supporting walls of course, the middle ones sometimes have brick, sometimes just wood and a panel-wall to support the (always slate) roof proper. As to madness, almost certainly, they're all barking (in an agreeable way).
- truculent 2y agoThere’s been DNA evidence for years: 2023: https://www.discoverwildlife.com/news/new-dna-evidence-confirms-presence-of-big-cats-in-the-uk https://www.discoverwildlife.com/news/new-dna-evidence-confi... 2022: https://www.nationalworld.com/news/uk/big-cat-sightings-where-and-when-have-they-been-spotted-in-the-uk-3855650 https://www.nationalworld.com/news/uk/big-cat-sightings-wher... 2003, and 2005: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-gloucestershire-16760599 https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-gloucestershire-167605...
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- gushogg-blake 2y agoI was camping and hitchhiking in the Lakes with a friend about 12 years ago. We aimed to get over High Street (a large hill) and to the next bothy within a day but it was harder than we expected, so we ended up setting off down the other side well after nightfall. The moon was out so light wasn't really a problem, but we were both a bit freaked out by not really knowing exactly where we were or what the weather might do (this was in January, and a blizzard did come through the next day - but even in summer you have to be careful there). There was about 6 inches of snow over everything and it was hard going on the way down - with lots of tripping over hidden rocks and worrying about slipping into cracks or over the edges of waterfalls etc - so we were both getting increasingly agitated. Anyway, about half way down we came upon some large animal footprints and stopped to look at them. They were very clear and we both thought they could have been big cat prints. They looked too big for a dog, and the location and time of year didn't make that much sense for casual dog walking and there were no other human prints around. We still had a few miles to go and camping out in tents or in a sheep shelter for the night was very much on the table, so I think we both decided to just put the idea of a big cat out of our minds, to the extent we took it seriously to begin with. Makes me wonder!
- boomboomsubban 2y ago>They looked too big for a dog Aren't larger dog breeds about the same size as big cats? Looking it up, a small English mastiff is larger than a big leopard for example. An escaped dog seems far more likely than an escaped big cat.
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- gushogg-blake 2y agoYeah, could have been a dog. I would say a dog with a human and we just didn't see the person's tracks is more likely than escaped though as we were miles from the nearest house and I think an escaped dog would have had the sense not to walk half way up High Street by itself in that weather. One thing about these prints is they were very clean though. This looked like something that was walking, as opposed to bounding this way and that like a dog sometimes does. All pure speculation of course, but with a dog + human I would expect them to be either walking together, or for the dog to be running around chaotically, still fairly close to the person.
- d--b 2y agoWell if the presence of big cats is advertised in the news, you can be sure that a bunch of morons will comb that part of land to get a chance to shoot the beasts and hang their heads to the walls.
- whythre 2y agoSeems like a fair reaction to a dangerous non-native predator.
- flir 2y ago(1) Put female leopard in heat in cage. (2) Surround cage with trail cams. (3) Wait. I can't understand why this documentary hasn't been made yet. However, if they're out there, I'd like to know why we don't get reports of treed carcasses. You'd think a dead sheep in a tree would attract comment.
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- jumploops 2y agoI once saw what appeared to be a mountain lion in northwestern Nevada. I couldn’t believe my eyes — it was moving parallel to the side of the road; I convinced myself I must have been hallucinating. Years later, I stumbled across 3 dead cows within a 5-10 mile span, all in various states of decay, also in Nevada. Spoke with a ranger and they offered that it might have been a mountain lion (I had assumed they were hit by cars). I then mentioned my experience from years prior, and the ranger said that mountain lions often hang out near roadways, as it’s an easy spot to find/observe deer and livestock.
- jamesfisher 2y agoWhat is "big cat DNA"? Are there not multiple species of big cat? Can a DNA test not be more specific? Edit: Answering my own question about the methods used: The story links to Robin Allaby's page [1] about his DNA test service. That page says he tests for "the Panthera, Puma and Lynx genera". An older story [2] describes Allaby's methods: 450 PCRs and ~600 sequence reactions. "The team searched for two gene targets each of deer and canid, but over 30 different cat gene targets." [1]: https://warwick.ac.uk/fac/sci/lifesci/research/archaeobotany/ecological_forensics/cats/ https://warwick.ac.uk/fac/sci/lifesci/research/archaeobotany... [2]: https://warwick.ac.uk/newsandevents/pressreleases/research_into_possible/ https://warwick.ac.uk/newsandevents/pressreleases/research_i...
- baerrie 2y agoJaguars and panthers to a lesser extent used to live over the entire globe so really andy habitat where there’s little enough human interaction can support them
- barkingcat 2y agoIt's Bagheera
- Beijinger 2y agoBased in the wikipedia link "hantom sightings are common throughout much of the UK, with BBC Wildlife Magazine in 2006 reporting the "top ten" counties or regions of Great Britain where claims of sightings had been between April 2004 and July 2005 were as follows..." What does this mean? Do we have to assume they have started breeding? Edit: Sightings since the early 90ies. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vQYrszfSbUE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vQYrszfSbUE I think it is safe to assume the little kitties have started breeding.
- hi-v-rocknroll 2y agoThe emphasized word should've been A. Where I lived last had more than one puma concolor and ursus americanus.