Big Cat Roundup 15

Reports of sightings received by BCIB during the last week. Several sightings this week date from a good few years ago. Clearly, people who see these animals retain vivid memories of their encounters.

England

Norfolk
Foulsham -- around 7 p.m. on the ninth of December, a witness and their mother saw what they took to be either a young bobcat (lynx) or a Spotted Cat cross the road in front of them.

Northumberland
A697 near Shirlaw Pike -- around 10 p.m. on the 13th of December a husband and wife saw a large catlike animal run across the road in front of their car. The cat was light-coloured, greyish or ginger-ish, and rather larger than a fox. It was clearly not a fox however, as its tail was thin rather than bushy.

Oxfordshire
Didcot -- at 8:15 a.m. on the 12th of December, a BCIB member saw, on the edge of woodland a few fields away from Didcot power station, a large black panther-like cat.

Shropshire
Shawbury -- on the 9th of December at 5:40 a.m. a large black cat-like animal crossed the road in front of a local man as he drove to work.
Read more at Shropshire Star

Sussex
Westfield, near Hastings -- at 7:20 a.m. on the 13th of December, a woman and her dog came across a large black cat lying down. The cat saw them, and ran away at speed across the field towards woodland.


Scotland

Morayshire
Dallas -- on Christmas Day 1987, two locals walking their dog near the River Lossie when they saw a large black cat jump over the bank and pad through the snow to the back of the sewage works. They watched the cat around two minutes.

Perthshire
Loch Earn -- sometime in the early 1990s, two witnesses who were going fishing off the south shore of Loch Earn, saw what they recognized as a Lynx or bobcat feeding around 40 feet away from them.

Selkirkshire
Fountainhall -- around 10 a.m. one day in the summer of 1988, a girl driving to Edinburgh with her mother saw from the car window a large black cat chasing a deer across a field and into the forest.


CatStats at a glance
Panther type (black) -- 5
Lynx type (pale, bobtail) -- 2
Unspecified -- 1