Ah. Yes I do believe I also found this article a week or so ago and my first thought was "congrats. You've finally caught up to the rest of us who already knew."
Thank you for sharing this. I've believed in British big cats for most of my life so it's great to have DNA evidence to support the sightings, along with tooth mark analysis from carcasses. Always felt bad for eye witnesses who get dismissed as having misidentified a housecat or a labrador, or who get criticised for not taking photographs when they only have a fleeting encounter.
Good point. You can tell if something is bigger than a house cat. I saw a bobcat on my driveway one evening, I actually thought it was my cat laying down outside and when I was about to go down to get him it got up and I immediately knew right away it wasn’t my cat it was bigger. So if someone really feels like they saw a big cat in their backyard I wouldn’t dismiss it right away. I didn’t even think of taking a picture I just watched it walk away in amazement.
You may be good at telling scale, but if you go to the animal IDing sub, you'll get smacked in the face by the sheer number of people who have no idea. At least once a day, someone uploads a picture of a house cat asking what kind of big cat it is. There was even a time when someone posted a picture of a long-haired white cat and asked if it was a fox. I've had family members tell me they saw a "massive" animal in their backyard, and when I was shown the picture, it was a raccoon with a winter coat. Realistically, many people absolutely suck at identifying animals and are terrible at reliably telling scale. I would immediately be skeptical, but I wouldn't immediately write it off.
All your points, mixed with the fact that most of these sightings are of black ones, a creature that's rare even in it's natural habitat, make me suspicious of most sightings. Specially when the only evidence is someone going, "I know what I saw with my own eyes!" Cause our own eyes are not reliable.
That and, it would be really hard for animals of such size to actually hide and survive in the UK.
That said, some regular colouration cats have been found, usually dead. Not a black one though.
yeah youre right. i cant expect everyone to be able to tell scale. i am a bit understanding now after my experience and will probably give people the benefit of the doubt. bobcats arent that much bigger than cats but i was able to tell right away. i am very familiar with my driveway as well haha. alot of people want to believe as well and that can compromise judgement
I remember being about 9/10 years old at my grandparents house, who live on the brown Clee Hill in Shropshire it’s surrounded by woodland, really beautiful area. My mom was taking our dog for a walk just a short distance up from theirs, I remember her running into the house without the dog sweating and panicking (my moms not a runner) swearing blind she saw big black cat. She said the dog had stopped dead in it’s tracks looking up into the trees, she obviously looked up to see what he was so interested in and said what she thought was initially a broken tree stump move, look up and stare directly at her. She just ran, as fast as she could. Silly idea in hindsight but thankfully what she thought she saw didn’t give chase and she was fine, just very shaken. Her eyes aren’t very good, she wears strong glasses but she also isn’t the kind of woman to make stuff up so whether or not what she saw was a big cat. She definitely saw something large which scared her enough to run. Her reacting stick with me to this day!
The dog was completely fine, he actually ran first and then my mom followed. He showed up in the garden a few minutes later. I probably should of added that!
The fact that it's apparently yet another black one makes me think somethings off.
Every sighting seems to be black, a rare phenomenon as it is.
Also 99%, reminder that that can still be a regular old cat.
No idea. Didn’t watch it. He thinks too highly of himself, I think he considers himself a proper wildlife biologist.
He’s far too “I know everything “.
I don’t find that at all tbh. He just seems like a guy who likes animals and wants to learn more.
His photographer friend seems a little pretentious though. Very talented for sure. But a bit full of himself.
Watch his videos on big cats in the U.K. he basically mocks and shits all over any witnesses and asserts with condescension (as if he is the go to guy in the U.K. - which he isn’t. He’s just some kid who thinks he knows it all) that there are no big cats In the U.K.
What happened recently? Why that would be finding big cat dna in the U.K.
So yeah, Cookie is a condescending asshole who has a YouTube channel and who’s only claim to fame is that Forrest gallante tolerates him.
I knew about cookie before him and Forrest became friends.
There are plenty of reasons big cat DNA could be found. Private pets or zoo animal escape are the ones that come to mind.
Well he never disputes that these can be isolated cases. There are over 5,000 privately owned tigers in America, and ever since the passing of the big cat public safety act almost 2 years ago they’ve been trafficked from other places to the US.
I don’t particularly think there’s a population running about. Unless DNA evidence proves that, it seems more likely that they found it from one stand-alone cat.
Yes it is surprising to you, no youre not tough for faking being unsurprised lol, life is not a movie where everyone will slowly start to clap for
Your “awesomeness” hahaha
As a Brit this is probably the most unsurprising news of the year. There’s been stories of these animals from all areas of the country for decades, few bits of film here and there, too much for it to be coincidence.
Still no body yet though.
The videos are often very unconvincing. So much forced perspective house cats and photoshop jobs
Cases of one or two of these actually happening can very easily be chalked up to zoo specimen and private pets escaping.
There are stories of big cats in PA since I’ve been alive even though they’ve officially been “extinct” in the area also since I’ve been alive. So I dunno.
I unfortunately know, it was a joke. My 17 year old kitty disappeared 2 years ago and I am sure dead. I still look twice at every black cat I see near my house.
So these sightings have been uncommon but very persistent for decades. Does that mean that individual animals just keep escaping, surviving for a while, then freezing, starving etc after a few months or years? It would seem hard to imagine even a small breeding population, but it also seems hard to believe that there is a steady stream of giant félids hopping peoples fences and zipping off into the wild. I know illicit private zoos are a thing, but still…
I would say so. There's close to zero chance we have a breeding, self sustaining big cat population in an island with less than 5% of its native wilderness remaining.
Sporadic escapes/intentional dumping is the most likely scenario.
We've known for years that big cats and other non native cats have eaked out a living in the UK, one of the very few cryptids we have confirmed carcasses and photographic evidence of.
My Dad always used to say that it would be massively unsurprising if there was a big cat of some description roaming the British countryside due to all the circuses that he went to as a kid that had alive, African animals included in those performances such as Tigers, Lions, Panthers etc. It’s incredibly sad looking back on it and he thinks the same by today’s standards but never thought anything different since he grew up on it.
I lived in those countrysides my entire life along with my family and when I had my own experience regarding one as a child in the forests, I was convinced. So much so that my Dad sent the story to a man who wrote a book on the possibility and it was published officially.
I’m not surprised by this article. If there are still ones roaming around where I live, I hope it’s left in peace. Leopards, Jaguars and Panthers are magnificent animals and deserved to be left alone, especially so if they’re around here.
Tigers are not African animals and I’m not sure you understand how much these animals eat. If there’s something it’s more likely an escaped exotic pet of a smaller size, and not a breeding population
Right. Assuming the DNA evidence is accurate, all it shows is that there’s one large cat in the countryside. The most likely explanation is an escaped exotic pet, which is known to have happened before. There’s a long way from this to a breeding population of large cats.
it'd not as of the UK never had a breeding population of big cats they just weren't panthers. still, given the current state of UK ecosystems I can't count it as anything but escaped pets. there's not e high prey for a sustainable breeding population.
A Google search showed the UK has more deer than I thought, but they won't he eating anything but deer and if you have them wild boar. they don't go after birds and rabbits because they aren't fatty enough and have not alot of meat.
it makes my idea less sound, that deer pop can support big cats.
Eye witness accounts show that rabbits have been on the menu as well as water birds etc but obviously I accept that eye witness accounts need to be balanced in terms of the weight you put up on them.
Wild boar are only in certain areas down south so don't expect them to play a large part.
well as is the case with any animal they're opportunistic if a need arises, maybe water birds and rabbits produce some nutrient that they can't get from English deer. I'm not saying it doesn't happen but my impression of UK biodiversity was that there was not enough deer and too many small animals to support big cats.
normally boar aren't big in a cats diet either but if deer were lacking they'd be able to support them. boat are usually too aggressive for lone hunting animals.
I have a wholly unsubstantiated theory that any breeding population of leopard or puma will be on the smaller side of the physical scale in the UK. I can't see, as a generalisation, the territory and prey providing for massive individuals.
On the flip side of my unsubstantiated theory, they will be absolute apex predators and will have the run of the place to find the calories and nutrients that they need to get bigger.
Do you have a link confirming the positive test? The lab linked in the article just says they’re doing testing and doesn’t provide any conclusions unless I missed something.
I’d love for this to be true but I think there’s a big difference between potentially planted fur on a fence and something like saliva based swabs on a kill or puncture wounds.
My thing is if this thing has killed livestock wouldn’t it have taken it to eat or at least partially eaten the prey prior to being scared off?
Trust me I wanna believe this one just cautiously skeptical. Hopefully a panther somewhere proves me wrong.
Yes, yes, yes.
You have no idea how happy this makes me. Iv believed in the British Big Cat phenomenon for years. I've read books and articles and truly believed it.
For years, people have taken the piss out of me.
So a big fuck you to them
Mega!!!!
Wow. I just read that article and this is massive. Finally all the witnesses in the British countryside of large black cats have been validated after years of being called insane, and I’m definitely interested to see more study done
There have been a few uncontroversial cases of big cats and other medium-sized cats being caught or killed in the UK. They are generally believed to be animals abandoned by people keeping them illegally as pets.
The question has never been whether there are ever any big cats. The question is whether there is a breeding population.
What if ABCs really are a paranormal phenomenon (like many sightings would suggest, and the sightings of many other cryptids) but because there is plausible deniability with panthers being a flesh and blood know animal, the phenomenon goes, here is some DNA, knock yourself out.
It’s just the teasing Trickster nature of the phenomenon. Like always blurry photos of bigfoot, inconclusive evidence, ridiculous high-strangeness, etc.
That's why cryptologists get dazzled by ABCs. Even the biggest skeptics have to concede it's possible. And they are all dying for scientific credibility.
Did we really need DNA at this point?
Although it is nice to see science support cryptozoology for once instead of ignoring the evidence because "why investigate something that's not real".
But we shouldn't take negatives from this. This is so cool and very exciting and that should not be discounted :D
How could this not be cryptozoology.
There has been a frequent debate and belief amongst the community that caspian and javan tiger might still be alive. Just like with thylacine and all.
However if it's true, then is no longer cryptozoology.
cryptozoology job is to be jobless, if a species is not confirmed it's cryptozoology, once it is, it's not their problem anymore, this is zoology now. (joke)
i subconsiously filed it in the "huh cool science" folder o my brain rather than cryptozoology for some reason. Probably cause like it was only "extinct " for like 15 years
[https://news.mongabay.com/2024/04/javan-tiger-extinct-species-indonesia-dna-wildlife-conservation/](https://news.mongabay.com/2024/04/javan-tiger-extinct-species-indonesia-dna-wildlife-conservation/)
we had recent sample of fur that are probably tiger
Was lucky enough to see one at fairly close quarters back in 2013. I was idly looking out of a train window a few minutes outside Warrington in the UK. No mistaking what it was. Quite an amazing thing to see in a farmers field in Cheshire.
No need to go that far back. People kept all sorts of insane personal menageries until the keeping of exotic animals for shits and giggles was banned in 1976 (the Dangerous Wild Animals Act). Since big cat sightings seem to start in the 70s and 80s, any extant population is probably descended from animals (obviously illegally) released when their owners were no longer allowed to keep them.
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