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I asked some British 'Big' Cat groups the above question. I write "some" as there are so many and I tried the fringe crypto people and..."regular" groups.
The crypto people are more for pretending to be scientific while spouting some blatant nonsense. Their aims are nothing more than ego boosting and building up a fan base.
The "regular" groups seem to consist of people with no natural history knowledge and their 'knowledge' of cats seems to come from some rather dubious sources -Di Francis is often mentioned and held up as an expert researcher and cat expert. Anyone who knew and spoke to Francis knows this was not the case! The groups seem to be rather like fox, badger and other groups on Face Book -social media fan groups.
I checked several posts I had made to some of these groups politely correcting incorrect facts that were given. I am never rude to people online as that shows ignorance and if you want to educate people on a subject do so politely. It seems that all of my posts barring one have been removed while the inaccurate statements remain.
These are all people playing at getting attention -whether in the press and media or online and with no serious interest in the cats they are "looking for evidence of" and absolutely no interest in learning about them.
We know the types of cat here, we know of their history in the UK, we have the DNA (not associated with publicity seeking documentary companies), we have the physical evidence and it was all documented by the late 1990s and freely available to anyone who looked for it -most is presented in Red Paper 2022 Vol. II: Felids and we are talking about acceptable evidence not videos or photos of house cats.
As a naturalist I keep my eye on what is reported but unlike the 1980s/1990s (before the internet) when people got in touch and were interviewed for up to an hour at times and often these people were directed to me by police forces the 2000s is marked as the time when a house cat, black fox, boar or anything including a dog cleaning itself in a field are taken as evidence of 'big cats'.
Basically these groups are like those playing with UFO reports. Nothing to take serious -unless you can prove otherwise?
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What are the aims of the current crop of British 'big cat' fans?
Well, looking at some of their online pages it seems name-calling, trying to start arguments and statements of 'fact' that "there are no such things as big cats in the UK" (so why are they on groups and why do admins allow/turn a blind eye to all of this?
Simple answer is that most cannot offer anything solid to counter the latter statement. The second possibility is that they are of the belief that arguments get going on groups then more views are coming -but since most are now private groups that will not work.
They catalogue sightings sent to them yet, very clearly, some of these reports are suspect while others are without a doubt misidentifications or fantasy -despite all the phone-cams out there all that seem to appear are photos or videos of pet dogs and cats.
https://exoticanimalsregister.blogspot.com/2023/03/what-does-british-big-cat-video.html
Genuine mistakes are genuine mistakes and the purpose of investigation is to detect these cases and look for the actual reality. It's rather like UFO fans who see every satellite, meteorite or party balloon as proof of extra-terrestrial visitation. It only proves "some people are plain special stupid" because even when shown the actual evidence and explanation..."No. It was alien" and the same applies to 'big' cats.
The Beast of Durham photo is still used as evidence of 'big' cats in the UK when it is quite clearly a fox with a rabbit in its mouth. It's like pointing to an elephant and stating "That is the Empire State Building".
Above: even if I had not been studying foxes since 1976 I would have no trouble stating that this was a fox. But what do we know? Can we prove that there are large cats in the UK?
Yes.
(c)2022 Dreamstime.com
Along with some of my contemporary fellow naturalists in the 1970s I set up guidelines on how to observe, track and record "non native" cats in the UK. By 1980 I had established the procedure to investigate cases and gather evidence -specifically of large cat species since other former exotic species such as wallabies were known and in their case it was merely an exercise in update where and when and offering advice when required.
Foal skull bearing teeth marks identified (by a top university professor specialising in this sort of evidence) as "large felid" (c)2022 EAR/T Hooper-Scharf
Even UK police forces for whom I acted as an advisor of large cats adopted many of the procedures. The most important one being to not draw lots of press attention that would create a panic or get the hunting groups blasting away at anything in the dark in the hopes of a "big game kill" -those people/groups exist and were often reckless and carrying out illegal activities of which trespass was the mildest. Those shooters have only increased in numbers since the early days.
The EAR Bulletin had a wide distribution amongst police forces and other bodies. Some of these getting into 'big' cat enthusiasts' hands the information in them (much outdated now) is still being used.
Yes, we got evidence in the shape of scat, kills, DNA from hair that was found by police after a panther close-to (6 feet) encounter in the late 1990s and even through forensic study of the bones of prey animals. A report of a large cat if reported by phone or letter would result in a series of questions that could last an hour and would establish the credibility of the observer/report -this is why hoaxers were spotted quickly.
puma droppings (c)2022 EAR/T. Hooper-Scharf
We had plans (along with a certain zoo) to trap a specific cat, take samples and fit a radio collar so that it could be tracked in the countryside. However, the team involved had a sneak who informed the Ministry of Agriculture Fisheries and Food (MAFF) -the predecessor of DEFRA- of our plans and it was made clear that if we trapped a puma we had no choice but to kill it or put it in a zoo (all of which were full at the time) and we were certainly not going to kill any cat.
Have no doubts about this: MAFF did not threaten us over actions to trap a "mythical" and non-existent cat. They knew full well that the cats were out there and they wanted evidence that any trapped cat had been killed. I was also warned by phone of the actions MAFF would take against me personally for "trapping and releasing a wild puma" into the countryside and one official even threatened to have all my EAR documentation seized on public safety grounds (they could not do that and this was said to frighten me. It failed).
However, a good network of contacts amongst farmers and foresters helped us to track the movements of specific cats and in certain areas we were able to denote which kill was down to which cat because each individual tackled and ate a carcass in a different way -it helped us identify when inexperienced juveniles made a kill, too.
Index card entries (c) EAR/T Hooper-Scharf
Everything was logged and then marked on maps that gave an overall picture of territories, flora and fauna in the area as well as possible habitats. It was not just accepted that a cat seen was actually a puma or panther or even lynx. If a predator of those sizes was in an area then it had to have water, cover and a good number of prey animals. We even found game routes taken regularly and this helped show us that, apart from some female cats with smaller (but still large) territories, some cats had big territories and even had a set pattern so that there were sightings in Area A then nothing for weeks or months: males were walking their territories at their own pace and that eventually led to new reports from Area A.
The data was all backed up by index cards because the internet was not around when the work began and when it was it was both unreliable and unsafe to store confidential reports on. Even today no reports are put online and nothing that might identify a witness.
(c)2022 EAR/T. Hooper-Scharf
Field work was carried out looking at everything from wildlife to the geographical landscape and for Wales this resulted in some interesting facts as well as maps. One person carrying out a field survey in a cat sightings area on a good, clear day looked up from his map to see a large black cat in the middle of the road and looking at him before moving off. The observer and conditions as well as distance between cat and observer meant this was no misidentification. In this case it seems likely that what he saw was not a panther and not a puma as a bedding area was later found that identified the cat species.
The observer noted above is what would be called highly credible. Over the decades I have spoken to police officers (some who used to laugh at reports of 'big cats') who observed these cats up close and many of these reports were never made public. In Wales a police dog handler observed a large cat and found it's kill which was without a doubt the work of a large cat -I don't believe that the photos taken were ever made public.
Veterinarians, zoo keepers, wildlife park workers and many others all went through the questioning and many were unaware that co-workers had also reported a sighting at the same time (confidentiality meant that they could not be told of other witnesses let alone have them named).
When you get a very respected senior lecture in zoology who has been a governmental expert witness and was familiar with pumas tells you that he has seen one under very good viewing conditions and noted every diagnostic feature before getting out of his car to take measurements (after the cat left) then it was a puma. No one would doubt his word. But what he saw was a black puma (the case is mentioned in The Red Paper 2022: Vol. 1 Felids). As the zoologist put it "I knew it was a puma. If I had seen a leopard I would not have gotten out of my car to take all the road measurements to estimate size etc".
Conversations with farmers and shepherds who got up close looks at the cats were also equally convincing as are the photographs of cat kills on file. Perhaps the big surprise for me in the 1990s was that the then head of the National Farmers Union told me that without a doubt there were large cats in the countryside and he and the NFU had seen the evidence. The then Hon. Secretary of the British Naturalist Association (f 1905) also had no doubts these cats were in the countryside and had seen one along with a colleague. Other BNA members had reported similar sightings.
Everyone it seems knew these cats were in the UK including DEFRA but the only ones who were "fighting the (non existent) cover up" and trying to prove 'big' cats were here were...the big cat enthusiasts. They are still trying today but what is the ultimate goal?
"T protect the public" and "To alert the public" but to what? The only genuine incidents of people being killed by big cats (lions, tigers and leopards) in the UK involved circuses and menageries where there was evidence or known mistreatment of the animals. There has been one proven hoax after another since the 1990s nothing genuine. Cats are seen by people and they move on and even in accidental close-to encounters the cat turns and runs off.
The leopard hair mentioned earlier was found in a derelict caravan used for storage next to countryside -the cat (details given and the witness' voice reinforced the authenticity of the encounter) hissed and showed its teeth (it was cornered after all and woken from a nap) then turned and leapt out a smashed window.
There is a very interesting background story but too long to go into here other than to say that the location was a small village with a long history of cat (puma) sightings. I was told by two people, unconnected and at different times, of their encounters in and around the village and both as an aside told me that the locations were near to a farm owned by a very odd old lady who walked about the village with an old style wooden pitchfork.
Months later I was contacted by a woman who did not want her name known but had several encounters with large cats on her farm. On one occasion she had left the farm to go into the village and as she turned the corner in the road so did a large cat (a detailed description). Both looked at each other and both quickly turned and ran off in opposite directions. This was her closest encounter and what she told me next ..."ever since then I don't leave the farm without my pitchfork. They think I'm mad but I always take it with me!"
Newspapers and media love "big cat" stories as they are good for a scare story or a laugh. Some newspapers -simply to boost sales- want to have the proof of "The British Big Cats" and that would be a story they could live off and drag out for moths.
Three times I was offered fairly large amounts of money by two national newspapers for copies of my maps -and that money would have been very welcome, however, I knew (from an inside source) that the intention was to pay someone to use my maps to try to find and kill a "big cat".
From the 1980s onward British newspapers as well as radio and TV described me as "Britain's Big Cat Detective" and that, embarrassingly, stuck. Offers of large sums of money for maps and locations of "big cats" were not uncommon but rejected as the whole intention was to send out people to find and kill a cat.
We can chart when the earliest sightings of "exotic" cats were as well as the origins of many and it might surprise many to learn that they go back to pre 1000 AD and that some are quite famous. Sightings of large black cats (with very good descriptions) go back a long way but 1700s, early and late 19th century right up to present day. Ignore the false release date of the 1976 Dangerous Wild Animals Act. Ignore the false release periods of 1914-1918 and 1939-1940s. Documents and reports provide all the data needed.
There are -and this really took me by surprise- villages in different parts of England where witnesses report sightings and I give the usual "be aware of a large cat in your area" speech to be interrupted by the person I am talking to saying "Oh we all know that" and running of the advice points. "Oh you've looked it up then?" I asked and was told "Oh no. My mum told me" so I ask whether the parent had lived in Africa or India and "No, only left the village a few times in their life"
So how then did they get and give this advice? "My mum was told by her mother" so then comes the indelicate question of asking how old the observer was and then finding out how old her mother was and then that mother's mother... in each case in these three villages the advice was first given to children in the 1930s but who gave the advice first no one knows. And a cat sighted in the 1930s is not going to be alive in the early 2000s. Going through notes and old reports the cat history in these areas does go back years but time after time I was told that no one reports a sighting to police or newspapers; these are quiet villages where lots of newspaper attention and hunters and the "fuss" they would create are not wanted.
We know that there is only one member of the Big Cat family in the UK and despite the word "big" it is not full German shepherd or even lion-sized as you will read on many sites or observers claim. Enough info is posted on this site for those interested in facts on this matter. The other cat is a member of the medium sized cats -the puma and people calling themselves "Big Cat experts" are silly in the extreme when they call the puma a big cat. The other most often noted cat is the lynx (unspecified species) which is a member of the Medium sized cat family (see The Red Paper for discussion on other species)
The whole reason that we know there were black pumas in the UK is that long list of questions referred to earlier in which people reported "pumas" but gave excellent descriptions of a black leopard and these were very close to. Or someone who saw a "leopard" but gave a perfect description of a puma and in some cases the cats were "almost charcoal grey" or "black" and no rosette patterns were seen. I did not simply accept "cat seen at 10 feet" and a basic description of "it was black"/"it was grey"/"it was sandy coloured" because if the cat was as close as claimed then the observers would have noted features and if they were 6 feet away and unable to describe ears or any markings then that was a report given low credibility.
I flatly rejected black pumas but then the reports backed up the research work (apparently even the more famous cryptozoologists do not bother doing research work but prefer continuing dogma) and looking at (again) the old sport and hunting books shows that there were and are black pumas.
We have high quality eye witness accounts -zoologists, police officers etc so if we exclude those we have ...
Kills that bear all the features of large cat kills and no fox or badger (as desperate debunkers have claimed) has the jaw power to bite of the head of a full grown sheep and they certainly do not kill and drag off foals or jump on to the back of a horse and leave scratch marks and very clear dentition in the horse's neck that were measured and matched puma dentition. There has been professional examination of bones and skulls by full qualified and noted forensic archaeologists that conclude markings show a large cat was involved.
We have evidence of puma scratch posts.
We have tracks of various cats.
We have had experienced cat trackers from outside the UK with no vested interest finding evidence of large cats (before and unconnected with any recent TV shows).
We have DNA
We have puma poop
Because of my work since 1976 I have also built up a good picture of cat territories as well as the impact on local prey species and really this was all achieved by 2000 and there is even a signed affidavit from a farmer who had trapped a panther and it was killed by a DEFRA assigned vet -much to his shock as a wildlife centre had offered to take it on (but that would be living evidence),
Oh, we also have photographs as well as taxidermy of large cats killed in the UK from jungle cats to leopard cats and lynx.
What is it British 'big cat' groups hope to achieve?
