A woman running with her dog at Penisarwaen, between Caernarfon and Llanberis, has reported spotting a “long, thin” black animal she believes could have been a puma.
The mystery creature made her Border Collie start barking before it jumped over a wall and wasn’t seen again.
Linda told us: “I was out running one morning with my dog (a collie). I was running up a narrow lane with fields on either side (one side higher than the other).
“I had my head down, as I was going uphill. My dog started barking at the bottom of the lane and continued barking all the way up. This was extremely unusual for her, as she doesn’t bark at people, dogs or cats. I couldn’t see any reason for her to bark.
“As I neared the top I looked up, just as a shape was leaping from one side to the other (low hedges on both sides). The shape was long and thin and dark coloured. It was only a second that I saw it, but the shape suggested a large cat, rather than dog or fox.
“When I got to the spot it had leapt, I looked over the wall where it had landed, but there was nothing to be seen. I cannot say for certain that it was a puma, or suchlike, but the shape and the reaction of my dog has made me think strongly that it was.
“I haven’t heard of anyone else seeing or believing something like that in this area, but I just wanted to record it, in case you have anyone else contact you.”
Linda’s encounter took place at around 7:30 AM one morning early in the summer of 2018.
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.
Earlier this month, there were multiple witnesses to a puma at The Dingle, Llangefni. We’ve also had recent reports from the Conwy Valley and Llandudno.
Previously, suspected big cat prints were found just a few miles from Penisarwaen at Rhiwlas, while last year, a man from Leeds came face-to-face with a puma while climbing Snowdon’s Crib Goch.
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.
Photo © Eric Jones (cc-by-sa/2.0)