In the last few months, we’ve had four separate reports of big cats and pawprints spotted in Snowdonia.
Bethesda
First, just after noon on Wednesday 6th April, Sarah had an encounter in Pen Braich woods near Braichmelyn in Bethesda, right on the northern edge of the National Park.
She told us: “I saw a large black animal ( I thought it was a dog) and it watched me walking by, so I tried Ti go near it but it disappeared into the woods, so quiet. I was out walking my dog on my own, but I called my husband straight away as I was shocked.”
Rhyd-Ddu
On Sunday 12th June, Adam was walking on a popular route to the Nantlle Ridge from Rhyd-Ddu, a popular starting point for walks on the ridge or up Snowdon.
A short distance from Rhyd-Ddu village, through a section of Beddgellert Forest and Cwm Dû, walkers cross a ridge and emerge in Bwlch-y-Ddwy-elor. Here, at the top of the Cwm Pennant valley, lie disused quarry workings with incredible views out to sea. It’s here where Adam found the pawprint, which he told us was “massive and looked like a cat print.”
Adam provided this map screenshot showing the exact location of the print.
Y Cribiau, bethania
At around 11pm on Monday July 4th, Max was out around Bethania, near Blaneau Ffestiniog. Though completely surrounded by the Snowdonia National Park, the town, including the location of this sighting, are not legally part of the national park because its towering slate waste tips were considers too unappealing.
Max told us: “I was practising night navigation while wild camping in the area and heard squeals of an animal nearby. About 5 minutes later I saw a set of golden eyes reflected in my head torch about 50m above me and 50 meters ahead of me.
“The reason I think it was a big cat is because I could see the ground and the eyes looked a bit high off the ground for it to be a fox. It stared at me for a while and I shouted at it, it looked away then back at me and then disappeared.
“I wasn’t convinced until I saw the other sightings near here online.”
Snowdon / Yr Wyddfa
At around 3:45 AM on Monday 25th July, Stephanie Robinson was walking up Snowdon’s Pyg Track just before the sun began to rise, when she encountered a brown or tawny big cat.
She told us: “As I was hiking up Snowdon, early hours of the morning with only a head torch, I heard a loud, aggressive growl come from a cave/sheltered area.
“I remained silent and turned off my head torch as I didn’t want to attract the wild animal that lay before me.”
It’s not the first time someone has encountered a big cat on this part of Snowdon. In October 2020, Jacques Wood, from Leeds, had climbed from the Pyg Track to Crib Goch before sunrise when he encountered a big cat and ran back to his car.
He told the press: “It was three and a half feet tall, four feet long and the legs were about three to four inches thick.
“I just froze. It was pitch black and I was on my own and felt vulnerable if I am honest. I started very slowly trekking backwards. I did not take my eyes off the animal.”
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 during the pandemic are 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.
Image credits: Snowdon by Mark Horrell (CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)