A large black cat, thought to be a panther, was spotted in a field in Anglesey on the evening of Friday, October 24th. The animal was seen off the road between Llanfechell and Llanfairynghornwy.
Joe told Puma Watch: “I was returning from a nice day in the east of Anglesey with a group of friends, back towards our hotel in Llangefni, and I spotted a large black cat in a field beside the road. We weren’t traveling fast so I got a good look at him: much larger than a domestic cat: it looked to be as big as a Labrador-Retriever dog only with a very long and thick tail. I got a good view of the side of the animal for a few seconds including of its head as it looked towards the car. Unfortunately, neither of the other guys in our car saw it (they were chatting in the front seat and I was in the back!). Thankfully however, when we got back to the hotel my other friend who was traveling in a separate car had also seen the very large cat at the same location.”
The sighting occurred in a rural area of north Anglesey, characterized by farmland and scattered woodland. The location is a few miles south of the coast and the port town of Cemaes. It follows a sighting near Holyhead back in August, when a motorist spotted a large black cat, thought to be a puma, stalking sheep near the Premier Inn roundabout in Holyhead.
Big cats are not native to the UK, but it is thought that a population of pumas and other big cats has been living in the wild since the Dangerous Wild Animals Act of 1976 made it illegal to keep them as pets without a license. This led to many owners releasing their animals into the countryside.
If you have seen a big cat, you can report it to Puma Watch via this form.