A massive black cat has been caught on video by a Trelogan resident, who filmed the animal from his kitchen window.
Jonathan said the creature, which he spotted prowling the fields to the rear of his house, was at least the size of a sheep and possibly even bigger. It was a distance of two fields away when being filmed.
When reporting the sighting via our website, Jonathan said: “Seen out of the corner of my eye through the kitchen window overlooking the fields behind the house.
“Filmed as I have been reading about these sightings and it looked far too big to be a regular cat and was more like the size of a sheep or possibly bigger.”
In the video, filmed around 2:30pm on 17th February, the witnesses can be heard in awe at the encounter, saying “that’s massive”, “well it is massive ’cause obviously you can see it from here” and “it’s stalking something innit.”
The location is within two miles of recent sightings in Talacre and Whitford. Other sightings and incidents reported in the vicinity include those at Whitford, Abakhan and Pentre Halkyn.
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.
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.
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.
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 month, Bellingcat exposed an international exotic pet trafficking operation, in which Instagram celebrities posted videos with animals including monkeys, sloths and a range of big cats, including baby tigers, cheetahs, lions and pumas. The animals were sold to buyers around the world from a base in Dubai.
Also this month, a London man was fined after neighbours spotted he was keeping an African wildcat at his home. He purchased the animal from an unlicensed Russian company. The man had previously been reported to authorities but had told them he didn’t own the animal before eventually being caught red-handed.
It’s likely that many illegal owners in similar situations would release such animals into the British countryside. This prevalent underground trade, now fuelled by Instagram and social media, could be big a big part of explaining why so many big cat sightings are now being reported.
Image credits:
Black cat image by Steve Wilson under CC-BY-2.0.
I live at gwespyr and it maybe nothing but we have had lots of noises at night and I’ve also found a claw but don’t know who to contact it may only be a badger but perhaps try to find out there are also lots of woods close by