Over the last week or so, we’ve shared two reports from the Prestatyn and Dysterth area. The first involved four hillwalkers who saw a black animal they believed could have been a puma “staring at them for a couple of minutes” before disappearing into gorse near Dyserth. Then, yesterday morning, a dog walker reported a “black panther” hunting rabbits and birds on and around Ffrith Beach in Prestatyn.
Since we shared those encounters, we’ve had three further reports from local residents.
Panther at Prestatyn Pontins
A member of the public who asked to remain anonymous got in touch this morning to report a “black panther” they’d encountered on Prestatyn’s Barkby Bridge around three weeks ago, at 6:30am on Monday 14th March. The location is around a mile from yesterday’s Ffrith Beach sighting and adjacent to the town’s Pontins Holiday Camp.
They told Puma Watch: “I was out on an early morning walk crossing Barkby Bridge when I startled a large black cat with glaring yellow eyes. It was startled and turned around and ran along rail tracks”
Back in May, police were called after a “huge jet black cat” was spotted lurking in the bushes near Prestatyn train station – only around 500 metres down the line from this sighting.
Panther near Meliden
Philip got in touch last night to share his encounter with a “black panther” in fields off Allt Y Graig, Meliden, near Dyserth Castle. It took place early one evening in July, around four years ago.
Philip told Puma Watch: “It was on the west side of Allt y Graig. It covered a distance of 50mtrs in approximately 6 long lunges. It was jet black. Its tail was very long. It disappeared into gorse. I was with my wife but she didn’t see it.”
Philip’s sighting took place at pretty much the exact same location as these pawprints were found in January 2021.
Suspicious remains near Dyserth
After reading the report of four hillwalkers being watched by a black big cat above Dyserth, Moira got in touch with us to share this image of a lamb’s remains scattered around a field in the same location.
Moira told us: “Regarding the sighting in Dyserth on Monday. I was walking on the mountain above Dyserth on Cwm mountain and came across a large amount of sheep’s wool in the field. It looked like the remains of a lamb.”
The image is provided above.
Just a few miles further inland from Dyserth, big cats have previously been spotted at Rhuallt Hill and in St Asaph. And in September 2021, an animal matching the same description as those above was spotted on the golf course adjacent to the beach in Rhyl. The location was only around 800 metres from the Ffrith Beach sighting reported yesterday which is just a few minutes’ walk along the beach.
Another set of pawprints, shown in the video below, were found near Dyserth in January 2021.
Big cats such as pumas are solitary with a hunting range of dozens of miles. They’re mostly spotted in Snowdonia and the Clwydian hills but reports of sightings in urban locations some distance from these areas are becoming more frequent.
Just last month, we shared a report of a big cat in Leamington Spa. While we focus on North Wales and the surrounding areas, we often receive reports from further afield and have shared sightings from as far out as Scotland and Cornwall.
As seen with Llandundo’s now-famous goats, who have taken to roaming the town’s deserted streets during the coronavirus lockdowns, it’s likely that the reduced levels of human activity over the last year is encouraging big cats to roam further from the hills into more populated areas.
When big cats were banned as pets in the 1970s, it was legal to release them into the countryside to avoid expensive rehoming costs. Owners from across the UK travelled to areas like Wales to release their cats in the remote environment, where small but significant populations have thrived ever since.
Earlier this year, the Welsh Government responded to the recent spate of sightings and confirmed the steps they take to investigate any reported to them, including taking casts of paw prints.
A visitor to a Snowdonia animal rescue centre back in 1994 recently claimed he was introduced to four puma kittens. He said: “I strongly suspect that these were released into the wild as they had no paperwork and no money to feed or house them.
“They certainly weren’t there six months later.”
Any further sightings can be reported to us via this form.
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Pontins imager credit: Jeff Buck (cc-by-sa/2.0)