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• There are many wondrous and amazing stories of various creatures throughout history. Here we have uploaded (with the kind permission of the author Ian Bond) The UK's Big Cat Diary, including the sightings and reports of these majestic animal wandering within the UK's countryside.

 The UK's Big Cat Diaries

by Ian Bond

Winter 2007
Big Cat Diaries – Winter 2007 Although I was tempted to put the BCD to bed at the end of last year, its as well that I didn’t as 2007 has been as bumper year for big cat sightings in the north east. July was particularly good, so much so that I had three in one day!
First I got a call from a former colleague on Stockton Council who manages Cowpen Bewley Woodland Park. The drive-on lawnmower man was cutting the narrow grass paths through the site that afternoon when a large cat jumped out in front of him. It was described as black, knee to thigh height with rippling muscles. The lawn-mower man does a bit of shooting, I was told, so wasn’t regarded as a complete novice to wildlife. He also knew that a sighting of a big black cat at the same woodland park had featured on Richard & Judy two weeks previously which, for some reason, had completely escaped me. I actually went and investigated this one, the sighting being only about 90mins old by the time I got there. CBWP is pretty big, a previous warden used to brag that the site in its entirety was bigger than the City part of London, but unfortunately there wasn't anywhere where signs would be obvious. Its mostly 15 year old woodland plantation which is very dense but with no mature trees for scratching or dragging ungulates up and no areas of mud for prints. My only line of evidence was a lady walking two golden retrievers from which I deduced that unless she’d started out with three golden retrievers, one of which had been eaten, then whatever feline the lawn-mower man had seen had probably legged it.
On checking my e-mails when I got home I had one from a Nina Scotland in Thirsk giving details of a sighting that she’d had. Although a little out of our region I thought I would quote it in full as it’s a pretty good description of a puma which had the advantage of something close by to help with the assessment of the size.
“After reading your big cat diaries, I thought you might be interested in the sighting I had recently. It was approx 3am, and upon a visit to the loo, I happened to look out of the window - it was only a crack. Initially I saw two cats, but they appeared to be massively different in size. I thought this was just due to the angle I was viewing them from, and the fact that I could only see properly out of the gap with one eye at a time. I opened the window fully, to see a small, domestic black cat cowering very low to the ground, moving slowly away from a very large, light brown/sandy coloured cat, sat near my garage. It was sat upright on its haunches (is that the right way to put it?) and at first glance appeared to be a large dog, but as it got up and moved towards the domestic cat, it was unmistakably a large cat. It was approx 2 and a half feet high at the shoulder - it was next to a car, so easy to assess height, and had huge paws and a large fluffy tail (I can't honestly remember how long it was, I was concentrating on the cat itself). The main impression I got was that it was of a playful disposition, and quite a young cat, but I could be mistaken! It trotted across the car park in pursuit of the scuttling, ears back, terrified domestic cat, and disappeared from view behind the houses. I have not heard any reports of missing cats on the estate, and no bodies have been found that I know of, so perhaps it was just playing! My colleagues reckon it was a Maine Coon, but it wasn't very fluffy apart from its tail, so I don't think that was it. Having seen the picture on your website of the cat running off with a rabbit in its mouth, I am of course comparing it to that, but the cat I saw was a leaner - maybe it couldn't catch rabbits and was trying small cats instead? Does that count as cannibalism? Anyway, I will keep my eyes peeled, and let you know if I see it again. We live on Alanbrooke Barracks near Thirsk, and the car park backs on to open farm land between Topcliffe and Thirsk/Northallerton. There are large wooded areas, and lovely hedgerows to hide in, and plenty of deer and rabbits to feast on!”
The third report was the best of the day, in fact one of the best ever given the quality of the observation and the qualifications of the observer. I got a call from a Police officer in Northumberland about a big cat sighting he had the previous day at 4.30am. He was driving slowly down a quiet country lane near Corbridge when he saw a big cat sat by the side of the road with a rabbit in its mouth. The cat was as big as his labrador and was brownish with stripes, like a brindled bull terrier was how he described it. The tail wasn't particularly long though not stumpy like that of a lynx. He said it was just like a normal cat only 6 times the size; the rabbit was almost engulfed in its mouth. He stopped and watched it for 20seconds from about 50 feet. He was in a video car but the video was switched off. He switched it on but the sound of it starting up must have spooked the cat, which then leapt off and disappeared (if only, if only!). He got out to investigate and estimated the height of the cat from surrounding objects. He later compared this to his lab and came out at about the same size, ie about 26 inches. I explained that no such cat was known to man (I forgot about Clouded Leopard, which might just fit the description at a push) Nevertheless he was adamant about what he saw. There was the slightest possibility that what he saw was a puma with the stripes being the effects of shadows, though he thinks not, but everything else he would be prepared to give as evidence in court, as he put it. He intends to do some more investigations and a bit of field work himself; I got the impression that this chap was pretty determined to get to the bottom of this, so there may be more to follow.
Meanwhile on 2nd July at Mountsett near Burnopfield a couple of people were walking their labrador through long grass near Mountsett Crematorium. As they played frisby with the dog, a large black cat was disturbed about 5m away from the dog and 10m from the people. They watched it for about 10-15 seconds as it ran away , jumping over the long grass. It was described as the same size as the 36kg dog and as having pointed ears; the latter point is interesting as black panthers have rounded ears whereas domestic cats have pointed ears. Also in July was a sighting which made it quite big in the Northern Echo down here with the title "Is beast back on the prowl?" As the article pointed out, its been several years since there have been any reports of big cats in south-west Durham. This particular sighting occurred at 10 o'clock at night on the new West Auckland bypass near Evenwood. The cat, which was walking across a field that had horses in, was described as 1-1.2m long in the body and about half a metre tall with a tail about two thirds the length of the body. The colour of the cat wasn't mentioned in the report, possibly everyone assumed that it was black. The cat didn't appear to take any notice of the horses but the horses seemed to be somewhat nervous.
Another big black cat with pointed ears appeared in a garden in Meadowfield Rd, Stocksfield in March. The cat, described as three feet high, body length four feet plus tail, was seen from four feet away in the following somewhat terrifying encounter: "My dog (Springer spaniel) and I had just returned from our morning walk and I was busy in garage. We are in a semi rural area, 1 acre of garden, backing on to a field with overgrown woodland bordering our fence. The dog rushed up to the fence barking violently at a holly bush. I went over to calm her down saying nothing was there. I moved to the right hand side and was confronted with this large black cat staring at me with yellow eyes just behind the bush/fence. It made no sound and after a few seconds started walking alongside the border fence into the undergrowth. I could hear it breaking branches as it walked over the area. I then decided to get in quick with the dog as she was still barking violently and feared for our safety. I have lived in the house for 28 years. In fact there was one reported in the local paper last week, but this was 10 miles away; believe this to be a different one. There were sightings last year across the road in a neighbours drive at night and there has been remains of deer found locally."

 Autumn 2007
Big Cat Diary Autumn 2007 The mapping exercise of big cat sightings that I undertook for the Big Cats in Britain yearbook article last year highlighted some interesting patterns about the distribution of big cat sightings. It largely indicated three main areas of sightings; the Trimdon Panther; a miscellany of cats that I am christening the Hexham Hotchpotch and the Guisborough Growler (actually it was never recorded as growling but I know how fond the countryside ranger types among you are of alliteration). The past few months have seen a new cat on the block in the Sunderland area (annoyingly I can't think of a name for a big cat beginning with S). The first sighting was in May, when a pensioner walking along the riverbank at North Hylton came face-to-face with a large black cat about 50 or 60 feet away. The cat, described as the size of a labrador, sat on the path staring at the man before, in the words of the Sunderland Echo, "scampering off into nearby undergrowth."
A similar looking beast was seen at Penshaw in June. The observer was quoted as saying "I was cycling along westwards toward Penshaw on the old railway line now used as a cycle track, I was going round a slight right hand bend then I saw this largish black cat like animal in front of me just strolling down the track. It then stopped about 50 yards away from me; when it saw me slowly did a u turn strolled back about 20 yards and did a left turn into dense trees and shrubbery.
While the sightings might be plausible on the face of it, I really have trouble believing in a big cat that both scampers and does U turns.
A more typical sighting and location saw a big black cat, described as 3 feet high and 4 feet long and resembling a black panther, run out in front of a car in western Tynedale near Halton Lea Gate in April. Being unable to find anything facetious to say about this I shall move on quickly back to home territory in Cleveland.
You may recall that I berated my former colleagues from the Wynyard Woodland Park for reporting an interesting big cat "record" to the Big Cats in Britain organisation but not telling me. It turned that the reporter wasn’t one of them, for which I humbly apologise, but soon afterwards I got another report from Dave Neal shortly afterwards. A resident in Woodside Cottages, adjacent to the centre, was up one night unable to sleep and was watching out over the fields at 2.30am when they saw a black cat running across the fields. The cat was described as being 1 metre long, which regrettably is the same size as a large moggie. However their enthusiasm in passing on the record was much appreciated and should be widely emulated. An even more dubious report also originated from the Wynyard Woodland Park. A woman, now living in Australia, contacted the Big Cats in Britain organisation to tell of how she was walking along the main path when she got the impression that something was watching her and that the something was behind a particular bush. She didn't actually see anything but as her party moved on they heard a crashing noise from the direction of the bush which convinced her that it must have been a big cat (obviously!). She then went on to complain that the authorities in charge hadn't posted any warnings about big cats in the area, as they would be capable of killing a small child. As it happens the Black Panther is listed on the site's virtual visitor centre as one of the animals that might be seen there but, as the case for big cats is still be regarded by many as unproven and certainly no small children have been carried off, it might be thought a little over the top to issue warnings just yet.
Another possible case of mistaken identity, though more understandable than mistaking a bush for a panther, was a report by a family who let their German Shepherd dog chase rabbits and hares along by the Portrack Marsh nature reserve. (This really annoyed Jonathan Pounder when he heard the story as he manages the site.) The dog chased an animal, which they described as a cat because it appeared to have a shorter face than a fox and didn't run like a fox. However it was reddish-gold in colour, 15" high and ran with its tail straight out behind it. Now what does that remind you of?
Still in Trimdon Panther territory, I had a more convincing case when I got a call from a chap from Hartlepool who had been out jogging one Saturday morning at around 10am on the Hart to Haswell Walkway, which runs north west from Hartlepool or, in the interests of fairness, south east from Haswell. Just before Hesleden he saw a cat's head poking up out of the grass verge.  He estimated he got within 30m before the cat got up and ran ahead of him for 20-30m before disappearing off through the grass again.  He got a brief side view and then a view from the back as it was running away. His described the cat as black and 24" high to the shoulder. He compared it to the Border Terrier that he had with him and said it was twice the height and three times the length of the dog. He even went as far as taking the dog into the grass where the cat had emerged from so could make a fairly accurate comparison though he did think better of continuing his run any further. Whatever it was it doesn't sound like your standard moggy and certainly not a fox, or a bush! 

Summer 2007
I haven’t had any reports sent to me recently so this edition’s reports have all come from the Big Cats in Britain (BCIB) website. They are all quite close encounters and at the very least don’t seem to leave much scope for confusion with domestic cats.
The closest of these was in the Whitworth Hall area of Spennymoor. A large black cat, described as a bit taller and 1.5 times the length of their Labrador crossed the road about 50 yards in front of their car. As the car pulled alongside the farm track which the cat had moved onto they got a good look from about 20 feet as it walked away.
Almost as close but this time without the benefit of a car in between was a report from Berwick on Tweed. This was from someone who was walking quietly through a wood and down to the river in the hope of seeing otters. In this report the observer actually had with them the industry recommended yardstick for measuring big cats, their Labrador. The animal was described as black, 3 feet high and 4 feet long plus its tail or, they conservatively estimated, one and a half times the length of their Labrador. It may have been watching some sheep that were grazing nearby in the woodland and seemed startled, reacting by running down a bank and out of sight over a brow only 10-15m from the observer.
The third was from Tantobie and of a large, reddish cat, described as being Golden Retriever sized (nice to see a bit of originality there). It was about 200m away but 200m isn’t much of a head start as you can imagine from their report:

“We were pushing our son up the road towards Tantobie in his buggy we became aware that an animal had walked out onto the road ahead by the bus depot as we continued towards it it raised its head and really scrutinised us I remember the hair standing up on the back of my neck and I turned to my partner and asked her if she was seeing what I was seeing it was during this time my mind was trying to fit what I was seeing with what I had in my head for reference at first I thought it was a fox because it was red then I looked along its long body and checked out the tail and realised it wasn't a fox the tail was way too long the worst feeling was knowing this thing was standing it's ground and was really checking us out I then remember trying to convince myself it was a dog?
Then suddenly a car must have been coming through Tantobie towards us as the animals ears pricked and then any doubts about it were completely dispelled as it leapt to the fence at the other side of the road, cleared it in a single fluid bound and disappeared across the field at full tilt this was when we realised it was a very large cat because of the way it moved it was beautiful we had always wondered what had been eviscerating lambs in the field at night because when it was lambing season there was always lambs taken in the night here and the dog would refuse to go out there the farmer would just pick up the carcasses and nothing would be said ! i remember reporting the sighting to the RSPCA and was suprised to be told i was the third sighting that year so I didn't feel such a fool I feel lucky to have witnessed this but am always reminded if the car hadn't come i think we were very definately of great interest to this animal !”

I was just getting round to writing this when I was surprised to find a report on the BCIB discussion group which referred to Wynyard Woodland Park. The report concerned a set of tracks found in late 2005, which lead from woodland across Pickards Meadow and back into the woodland. It had snowed earlier in the day so the tracks were no more than 3 hours old. They were described as cat tracks as opposed to fox, dog or badger, 3-4” wide and without claws. The reporter obviously knew the area well and even knew of previous reports. I decided that I must follow this up but on re-reading the report I noticed that they had said that they had found them when they were going to do some work on the pond. In other words this was someone who worked there, ie someone who I used to work with, ie someone who I still often visit to lead bat walks for or just to drink their tea and eat their Freddo bars, ie someone to whom I regularly point out to that I would be very interested in unusual wildlife records, particularly ones of big cats. I did think about embarrassing them by mentioning it in this column but I think I can understand where the misunderstanding has come from. Which leads me to a bit of a confession. Since turning 40 a number of my powers have diminished rapidly. My eyesight has declined from being able to tell the reproductive state of a male bat by the amount of dark-colouration in its epididymus to the point where I can’t even say if its got a willy (and bats are quite well endowed in that respect). But even more worrying my psychic powers have crashed. It’s got so bad that I’ve gone from knowing all of the mammal sightings that group members have in their heads the moment I sit down at the computer to write these columns to the point whereby if you don’t actually tell me I don’t know about them. I hope that you will all humour me and take time to drop me an e-mail or give me a ring next time you see something that might be of interest. (I might add that the mammal recorders aren’t getting any younger either so you might want to copy them in as well) Ian Bond

Spring 2007
Spurred on by a request from the Big Cats in Britain organisation for an article for their Yearbook, I’ve finally got round to collating all of the alleged Big Cat sightings that I’ve received into some sort of a report. Since I started the Big Cat Diaries about 6 years ago I’d received some 65 reports as of last November. Of these forty-two can best be described as Panther; five as Puma; three as Lynx with fifteen unspecified. The unspecified category included those second-hand reports where there wasn’t sufficient detail given to assign the animal to a species category. It also included a few first-hand reports which might have been well observed and clearly reported, but where the description didn’t comfortably fit with a known species. At the end of the report I concluded that:
“From the quality of some of the reports there is good reason to believe that there are, or have been recently, Big Cats of at least three different species at large in the North East. What seems equally as clear though is that these are largely isolated individuals and, even allowing for the occasional breeding event, this is a population that would be described in any other circumstances as critically endangered or even effectively extinct. In my opinion, whether we continue to have Big Cats in the North East depends either on future surreptitious releases or whether there are viable populations of these animals in other parts of the country from which individuals could disperse into the region; whilst the former is always possible, the latter I think is very unlikely.”
For those who would like a little more detail I am happy to e-mail out the report if you want to contact me on ian.bond105@ntlworld.com or you could buy the whole Yearbook from the BCIB website.
Having come to the above conclusion, I thought that this might be a good point to draw the “Diaries” to a close however the reports keep on rolling in so I shall probably continue with them until the clammer to stop reaches my ears.
At the beginning of December, Jonathan Pounder and I led a guided walk entitled “The Path of the Panther”. We weren’t expecting to find any panthers but rather used it as a badge to try and drum up some interest for a walk through, what is probably, the least-populated and least-explored part of East Durham. We’d planned the walk before I’d plotted the Big Cat reports onto a map and I subsequently found that most of them were actually from further south or east with the only recent one near the route being the sighting at Pudding Poke Farm last year. As confirmation that this isn’t Big Cat Country we were talking to one of the farmers. He mainly farms sheep, several hundred of them in fact, and he claimed not to have seen any evidence of a Big Cat. However, a few days after the walk George Howe was told by a farmer next to Pudding Poke that last winter he saw very large paw prints that weren’t dogs in the snow at the back of his house. The resulting publicity from the walk has so far produced several other reports, one of which is reproduced below:

“I saw the article in the Northern Echo re: Big Cats in the North East and thought I would tell you about my sighting. It was perhaps 8 years ago. I was with another family member in the kitchen of my home in Sidehead, Weardale, when we saw a big black cat walking through a flock of sheep. Because it was walking through the flock, we could easily tell the size of it - body length about the same as the sheep, with a tail about as long again, held low. Height-wise, up to the shoulders of the sheep. It was early morning and very sunny. The cat didn't bother the flock - they just carried on feeding with hardly a glance. The cat just jumped over a wall and disappeared from sight. Another family member saw a Big Black Cat 2-3 years ago crossing the road in front of her car as she was travelling home from work after dark near Lanchester. Unfortunately, as is usually the case, we don't have exact dates and we don’t have photos, however, I hope this helps”

Other reports recently received :

• July 06. Big, puma-sized albeit low to the ground, black or very dark, cat running along road in front of the witnesses car for some seconds, on the road between Ledgate and Lanchester. (Report via Veronica Carnell)
• Three reports via Phil Roxby at Darlington Countryside Section. Two were of a big, black cat in 2004 at Skerningham Woods in Darlington. Interestingly, for me at least, this is less than a mile from where I live. The third was of a puma, seen in 2003 between Darlington and Hurworth.
• A black, panther-sized cat was seen by a Durham County Council countryside ranger at Hardwick Hall, near Sedgefield, seven years ago.
• Sitting in the planning department reception talking to George Howe about animal footprints, a man waiting to see about a planning application overheard and asked if we were talking about the big cat. He and another witness had seen what they classed as a big cat last summer as it ran between some bushes near the A179/A19 junction. He described it as black and three feet long not including the tail. Also in the snow last winter he found large cat-like footprints, the size of his hand, in his garden in Hartlepool, which at the time was on the edge of a new housing estate overlooking the countryside. The prints were so large that he felt that the cat that he had seen must have been a youngster as whatever made the prints would have to have been much larger. He claimed that several people had seen the cat and talked about it as if its existence was taken as read.

Picking up the subject of whether there are enough Big Cats in captivity to fuel any future leaks into the wild, the Big Cats in Britain organisation has finished its FOI grilling of Local Authorities for details of licensed dangerous wild animals. It has now collated a total of around 160 exotic cats in private ownership. These include 16 leopards of various sub-species (8 of which were melanistic); 16 snow leopards; 20 lynx and 6 Puma. It is now starting to collate the number of exotic cats held in zoos or other public collections; there’s no way of knowing how many unlicensed cats are being kept but I’d wager that there’s more than one or two. As well as the cats the survey also found, in private ownership (to the tune of the 12 days of Christmas please); 6,000 wild boar; 2,000 farmed ostriches; 500 assorted monkeys; 300 American Bison; 250 poisonous snakes; 50 crocodilians and (altogether now!) a partridge in a pear tree!

If after all this you haven’t had enough of Big Cat sightings then the Big Cats in Britain organisation is organising their conference 23rd-25th March in Hull, costing £14 per day or £20 for the whole weekend (see attached flyer).

And finally! I get a bit repetitive saying that I’m going to end with a tale to end all tales but there no way I could add anything to the following from John Drewett; just bear in mind that his encounter was post the 1976 Dangerous Wild Animals Act!

“Around 25 years ago I was the voluntary warden for a woodland nature reserve in east Surrey. Each winter we held regular work parties during which volunteers helped coppice the hazel and sweet chestnut. On one winter’s day I was showing new volunteers around the wood during our lunch break when we spotted a large animal in one of the tree tops. As it slowly descended to the ground we got a good look at it, so I was later able to identify it as a coati. A member of the raccoon family, coatis are normally found in central and south America, rather than the Home Counties! I was also press officer for the Surrey Wildlife Trust at the time so sent off a news release. This gained coverage in the national press and also attracted the attention of MAFF who wanted to know why I hadn’t caught it and handed it over to them! I visited the reserve with a MAFF official who wanted to trap the animal to stop it breeding (I always thought two animals were needed for this!), but as MAFF were not prepared to monitor their own live trap and I had a full time job 35 miles away, nothing happened. No more was seen of the coati till the next winter, when I had a similar encounter again. Then, the following month we were coppicing near the road when a lady turned up asking for her coati back! I explained that I didn’t actually have it, but asked for her name and address so that I could let her know if I saw it again. Her property turned out to be a house beside the wood, about a kilometre away. As MAFF also had an interest in this animal I passed on her details to them. They later contacted me to say they had visited the lady who kept various exotic animals in her garden and hired these out for filming purposes. The garden had no security other than a four foot wooden fence. Among the animals they found when they visited was a tiger. Now that would have livened up a coppicing session!”

Winter 2006
Big cat sightings have again been few and far between this quarter, but it has at least seen the re-emergence of a couple of former favourites. Perhaps the best of the sightings was of a Puma at Dipton; the Durham Puma no less. In May of this year, a man was out walking his dog around the edge of a field, when he was aware of a big cat in the stubble. The cat was only 20-30 yards away from him and he saw it for about 20 seconds in total. It was described as being sandy-brown and about 3’ at the shoulders but longer than a German Shepherd.
Back in my patch, I was pleased to hear that the growling bush at the Castle Eden Walkway has made a comeback.
You may recall that I, along with several visitors, had an unnerving encounter with this menacing, auditory Cheshire cat-like phenomenon back in 1999. Now one of my placement students, Richard Blackburn has had a similar encounter, my influence obviously rubbing off there. I’ll let Richard tell it: “A couple of weeks ago I was walking along the CE Walkway, and I turned off onto the Thorpe Larches footpath. About a hundred metres (GR399267) along I thought I heard some rustling in the vegetation to the right (north), but wasn't sure because my backpack was making a noise. So I stopped and did in fact hear some noise from the vegetation and then I heard a kind of high pitched growling - like a defensive or scared snarl. And that's about it, I didn't see anything. It was one of those incidents where about 5 minutes afterwards you wonder whether it was anything at all.”
It wouldn’t be the Big Cat Diary without a black cat sighting and there have apparently been a number of them this year at Lowick in Northumberland. Two of them were in early September, one seen at a distance of about 100 yards, the other from someone operating a JCB.
I recently came across two reports, from 2002, of a tiger near Consett. One of the sightings was by someone who evidently came close to hitting it with his car. He described it as being as big as his black Labrador, not the typical orange colour, but with tiger stripes. (So a medium sized, stripy animal, a bit like a brindled greyhound perhaps?). I am understandably a bit sceptical of tigers on the loose, but curiously there have been reports of them in North Yorkshire this year. The first was in April, just off the A19 between Thirsk and York.
What makes the sighting intriguing, if true, is that the observer claimed to be a qualified biologist who had previously worked in a zoo with reptiles and big cats, including two sub-species of tiger.
He didn’t get a long look at the animal but described the animal as being the size of a ¾ grown male Bengal tiger with what looked like a mane ruff. There were then another 3 reports of tigers around the Tadcaster area in June. In one of the sightings, seen from a distance of 50-100 yards, the animal was described as being 6’ long and orange with black stripes.
For my part, having come across a very large, cuddly “Bagheera” and Winnie the Pooh laid by the side of the road, I would love to find a Tigger to complete the set; after all they are wonderful things!

Autumn 2006
The reports in this edition all come courtesy of the work of the “Big Cats in Britain” (BCIB) organisation. In addition to their usual activities as a focal point for records and doing “vigils” one of their members had the bright idea of contacting every Police Force, under the Freedom of Information Act, to ask for their records of where a big cat had been reported. Not all of them have replied as yet but the Cleveland Force has and their six reports are inserted below:

1. 29/09/2000 Masefield Road Hartlepool. "big black cat bigger than a dog, sure not a dog" note newspaper Hartlepool mail featured similar sighting on Hart by-pass several days previously.
2. 13/08/2001 Phoenix park Hemlington Middlesbrough. "large cat possibly a lynx"
3. 04/04/2002 Danby Road beck Norton, Stockton on Tees."Black panther, large black animal with long tail & orange? yellow eyes"
4. 18/09/2002 Lingdale road Boosbeck. "large black panther type cat"
5. 07/12/03 Stillington stockton on tees. " large black cat type animal convinced not a domestic animal".
6. 09/12/04 Errington wood, new marske "black panther, very large black cat to big to be domestic cat".

The same enterprising BCIB member also got the group to contact all Local Authorities to ask for records of which species they had licensed under the Dangerous Wild Animals Act. Again not all responses have been received but so far the list runs to 144 individual cats held in 17 different locations (see below). These are only the ones that are in private hands. None of the Local Authorities had any reports of escapes!

Asian Leopard Cat. x 10;
Bengal Cat x 25;
Bobcat x 4;
Caracal x 7;
Leopard (Amur) x1;
Leopard (Clouded) x 8;
Leopard (Common) x 5
Leopard (Melanistic) x 7;
Leopard (Persian) x 3;
Leopard (Snow) x 16
Lion x 6;
Lynx (Northern) x 2;
Lynx (European) x 13;
Lynx (Siberian) x 2
Geoffreys Cat x 2;
Jaguar x 1;
Ocelot x 5;
Puma x 4;
Scottish Wild Cat x 16
Serval x 2;
Tiger x 5

There were only two reports from this region. The first was from a couple who were holidaying near Wooler who saw it twice. The first time they were driving out of Wooler Common at 9.30pm when they saw a cat about 100 metres in front of them, standing in the road. The cat stood still until they got within 20metres of it when it bounded off through the hedge. The next day the man was walking past the same spot when he saw the cat 250 metres away across a small valley. They described the cat as being 6 foot long in total and two foot high.
The second report was actually just down the road from me in Darlington. A man in Gainford had been hanging out cooked chickens to attract foxes so that he could shoot them and was surprised when a “big” cat came along instead. He described the cat as being greyish with dark markings and small ears. It was 3 feet long and 3 feet high; I’m not sure whether he meant it was 3 feet high when it stood up to get the chicken, or that it was in fact square. As it happens, cats that are 3 feet long and greyish with dark marking aren’t that rare in these parts, so I decided not to pursue this.
Finally big cats have again pursued me on my holidays. This year I was down in Suffolk and came home to find that there had been two reports of a big cat within a few miles of where I was staying whilst I had been down there - I must remember to put it in a cattery next year.

 Summer 2006
Hot on the heels of my recent remark that I hadn't heard of a good report of a puma in the north east for 7 years, I had a phone call a few weeks back from Tony Henderson of the Newcastle Evening Chronicle asking my opinion on a sighting that had just come to light.
The sighting on 18th October last year was by several members of staff at Northumbria University. They were watching a large animal in the long grass on the Benton campus which, when it appeared fully in view, turned out to be a large cat. The description was along the lines of long brown tail, body light brown to cream, head a bit darker and small for the size of the body. The animal was described as the size of a large dog. They managed to watch it for several minutes.
Whilst it would be nice to be able to announce the return of the Durham Puma (ignoring the fact that this was north of the Tyne) doubt has been cast on this explanation by none other than our own Kevin O’Hara, a man who was surely a carnivore himself in a previous life J. It turns out that the sighting was almost in Kevin’s backyard and as he puts it a) there’s no way there would be a puma wandering about there without him noticing some kind of sign and b) why hasn’t it eaten his dogs by now? I must admit it’s a bit puzzling as to which part of the woodwork a puma could have appeared from, there not being any sightings for such a long time, but there aren’t many cats, big or small that would fit the description given. Your guess is as good as mine.
Chris Hall, who is a member of the organisation “Big Cats in Britain” and who lives in Billingham recently sent me copies of lots of press articles on big cat sightings dating from the early 1980s to early 1990s. The articles were a fascinating historical testament to the big cat phenomena, as this was the heyday of the Beast of Bodmin and the Durham Puma. I had always been under the impression that there were lots of reports of the Durham Puma at that time, but what struck me about the articles was that that they tended to recycle what were just a handful of reports, and not all of them definitely big cats. Certainly there was nothing to suggest that there might be a population of big cats out there, though interestingly some of the big, black cat sightings were from the same area as the present day, so-called Trimdon Panther (so-called by me that is, though I’m sure it will catch on), which might suggest that breeding has occurred at some point.
I thought I might have actually solved the mystery of the Trimdon Panther last week. Driving home along the A1(M) between Sedgefield and Darlington I noticed a large black object by the side of the road, which I assumed was a blow-out from a lorry tyre. I glanced over at it as I passed and was completely taken back to notice that it was furry and I even fancied that I saw a large rounded paw. A black animal that size could only be a Labrador or a panther and that paw was too large to be a Labrador. For the next hour I played over what I should do: should I risk stopping on the hard shoulder and throw it in the boot; should I ring the police and risk looking stupid if it wasn’t a panther; could I risk someone else getting the credit for finding it? Anyway, before I decided on a course of action, I persuaded my teenage son, Paul, to travel back up with me so that he could have a better look from the passenger seat as we drove past it again. (Fortunately he regards this sort of behaviour from me as being quite normal though I suspect he doesn’t mention it to his friends!). I drove back up the opposite carriageway to Sedgefield, repeatedly explaining to Paul what he would have to look out for in what would just be a brief glimpse (though I was prepared to do a few more circuits if necessary). We drove back south again, scanning ahead to try and take in every detail of this black object and, as we approached, its identity became only too obvious; someone had thrown a life-size cuddly toy onto the hard shoulder. Please don’t tell anyone!

Spring 2006

The Trimdon Panther made another appearance last October when it appeared off Coal Lane west of the A19. A local farmer was outside his car opening a gate when the cat walked across the road, lit up by his headlights.
Meanwhile, not far down the road at Wynyard, there’s been an unusual visitor at the bird table. My informant was serving a customer who was buying large quantities of bird food and in the conversation asked what was the most unusual thing the customer had had in his garden. To his surprise the customer replied, “a Puma!” It turns out that a large black, Labrador-sized cat (so not actually a Puma) had twice been in his garden. The customer had also seen the same animal on the Wynyard Road out of Billingham, early one morning.
My contact details are now on the “Big Cats in Britain” website, which resulted in a call from a concerned lady from Newfield near Chester le Street. A neighbour had told her of an early morning sighting of a cat the size of a retriever walking along one of the walls around her family’s farm. The cat jumped across the gap of a farm gate without any appreciable effort. The lady in question had herself seen a similar creature from fairly close range about three years previously near Plawsworth. The animal was black and the size of an alsation. She reported the sighting to the police who apparently didn’t take too much interest, but told her that there had been loads of sightings in that area.
According to the Gloucestershire Echo the police force in that county were taking big cat sightings more seriously and had instructed their Wildlife & Environmental Crime Officer to record sightings and gather evidence. There was also a short article in the Northern Echo about the Baglan Beast in South Wales. It seemed that there was proof positive of the existence of a big cat there when an off-duty police officer saw it; casts were made of its footprints and some hairs from the footprints were sent away for DNA testing. The hairs were confirmed as coming from a big cat, but the article just said that it was a puma or a lynx. I would have thought that if they could get it down to big cat as opposed to domestic cat, they could distinguish between lynx and puma. However there now seems to be some question as to whether all these bits of evidence were connected. That is to say: that the hair was from the footprint, that the footprint was from the big cat, that the big cat was the one that the police officer saw, down in Baglan town in the morning! (Make up your own tune!)
Just when I think that I’ve heard the best ever big cat story, something comes along to top it. My new best story concerns a farmer near Richmond who was out driving around his land on a quad bike. Just as he was passing a pond, he looked back and saw what he thought was his Labrador following him. Getting off his bike to scold the dog and send it packing back home, he found himself face to face with; you guessed it, a big, black cat. He was close enough to see the long tail sweep down and back up again, close enough even to see its yellow eyes, in fact he was so close that, realising that he wasn’t armed, he jumped into the pond to get away from the cat. There really ought to be a prize if anyone can beat that one!

Winter 2005
The first two encounters in this edition come courtesy of the British Big Cat Research Group and its indefatigable editor, Mark Fraser, and both involve sightings in two of the North East’s big cat “hot spots”. The first encounter was in early July when a large, “panther” type, cat was seen by a family near Tynedale. What was possibly the same animal was seen shortly afterwards at Duke’s Wood, Hexham when what was described as a large cat walked across the path in front of a dog walker. The encounters were recorded in the Hexham Courant, but unfortunately it doesn’t seem to have bothered with details like colour, how big “large” was or how soon after “shortly afterwards” was. The next report, although brief, seemed much less ambiguous. It was at Pinchinthorpe, near Guisborough, in early August where at around 1am, a large black cat leapt across the road in front of a car. The driver and passenger estimated that it was 3’ high with a body about 4’ long plus the tail. The driver’s immediate thought was Afghan Hound, by which I take it she meant big with a long tail, rather than resembling an emaciated, four-legged womble. She also reckoned that had they been going any faster they would have hit it, which would have definitely put Pinchinthorpe on the map.
You may recall the sighting by Jack Smurthwaite at Elwick, Hartlepool where he reported a mother and cub. There was a follow-up report a few weeks later at Castle Eden Walkway, but surprisingly no other reports turned up. I caught up with Jack again recently and he was telling me about taking part in the ITV documentary on the Durham Puma. He said that a farm worker had seen it a couple of weeks after his sighting on the other side of the A19, ie about a mile away, but wouldn’t come forward for the programme. He also claimed that a number of other people had seen it but again wanted to keep it to themselves.
From time to time I’m called on to give talks about various mammals and I reckon that the best thing about it are the new mammal records that you get off the audience. I spoke to the Darlington Wildlife Group last month on “Mammaliens” or “Alien Mammals” for those of you who can’t stand puns. Rounding the talk off with some of the odder mammals that might have been living in the British countryside I mentioned big cats. As it happened a member of the audience knew of a couple of sightings local to Darlington, both of them earlier this year. One was by a water board inspector who saw a big, black cat from a distance of about 50m. The cat walked in front of two stacks of bricks, which the inspector later measured as being 40’’ apart. The cat’s body, minus the tail, was the length of the gap. I wasn’t sure of the exact location that he was describing, but it was in the Eaglescliffe, Urlay Nook area and would have only been a couple of miles from Burn Wood where it was reported in the last edition that a deer carcase had been found up a tree. The other record was from Middleton St George, which is just a couple of miles from Burn Wood in the other direction. A friend of my informant had seen a big, black cat there on two occasions at the beginning of the year.
I’ve found some more details on the (dead deer killed by big cat/lambs killed by wolverine) story that appeared in the last two editions. The story stems from an article in the Evening Chronicle in March, in which a farmer is reported to have seen a big cat chase a deer over a fence into some trees and kill it. The dead deer mentioned above was the carcase that was later found at the spot. The suggestion of wolverine was reported as being made by Eddie Bell in response to some lamb predation. Hopefully that makes things a little clearer.
Recent radio-carbon dating of lynx bones found over 100 years ago have brought the species’ history in Britain that bit closer to modern times. It used to be thought that the lynx became extinct in Mesolithic times c3500bp, but in recent years a lynx bone from Scotland was carbon dated to c1800bp. The latest findings, sponsored by the Yorkshire Dales National Park Authority were on bones from two caves near Settle, one of which was dated to c1800bp and the other to c1500bp. The findings also shed light on a seventh century poem, which mentions a game animal from Cumbria called the llewyn. Although originally thought to be the lynx this was dismissed because lynx was assumed to be extinct then. This now appears not to have been the case and brings the lynx up to medieval times. The find is significant because it lends weight to the idea that the lynx died out due to anthropogenic factors rather than changes in climate. If that is the case, the government is obliged under the EC habitats Directive to consider its reintroduction. I think its time for a letter to my MP!
Perhaps my strangest record so far, and there have been some strong contenders for the title, was of a photo sent to me by a young lady from Sedgefield. She had been walking with her boyfriend in Hamsterley Forest when they came across a deer acting strangely ie wandering about the path in front of them as if dazed. She took her camera out of her bag and tried snapping a photo but, by the time she did this, the deer had wandered off and all she got was a picture of some trees. At least that’s all she thought she’d got, but when she viewed the pictures on her telly, there was a pair of turquoise eyes staring back at her from a cat-like shape. Thinking that it might be a big cat and concerned that someone should know about it, she rang me to ask if I could identify it for her. As you can imagine I thought this could be it, the Durham Puma finally revealed. I was therefore more than a little perplexed when I got the photo and couldn’t see anything resembling a cat (or anything that wasn’t a tree really!). Until, that is, I decided to zoom in whereupon a pair of eerie turquoise eyes appeared on the picture. I still find it unnerving when they pop up, even though I’ve seen the picture lots of times now.

This definitely wasn’t a big cat but the dark shape that the eyes shone from looked vaguely like a long-legged cat and my deflated hopes held out for the faint possibility of a small lynx. Thinking I needed a second opinion I sent the picture to Kevin O’Hara who digitally sharpened and lightened it to try and show more detail, but instead of becoming clearer the cats body mysteriously disappeared leaving just a pair of shining eyes. To Kevin, the matter of fact zoologist, it had just been my imagination or, at best, a small mustelid (everything’s mustelids with Kevin J), but coming from Darlington, the home of Lewis Carroll, I knew exactly what I was looking at. Here in front of me, after an absence of over 100 years, was the Holy Grail of cryptozoology; none other than a living descendant of the Cheshire Cat!

(Inspired by this validation of North East mythology I’m taking the shadow herpetology section up to Chester le Street; we’re not coming back without proof of the Worm!)

 Autumn 2005
First up for this edition was a sighting by John Armstrong, again at the Castle Eden Walkway, albeit 10 years ago. John was there at 5.30am studying rabbits for an environmental studies degree. He noticed that the rabbit he was watching was watching something else. The something else turned out to be a black cat the size of labrador and longer than an alsation. He watched this for a few minutes at fairly close range before the cat moved off. Further down the track he saw another, smaller black cat which may or may not have been associated with the first one.
According to another of my sources, he knows a farmer who knows a farmer who has reported sightings of a big black cat at Burn Wood south of the A66 near the Stockton/Darlington border. Also reported were the remains of a deer up a tree
You may recall in the last edition that I mentioned some sightings and dead animal remains near Blanchland that might even have convinced Eddy Bell that there really was a big black cat out there. I have since read that Eddy reckons that these might actually refer to a wolverine. Actually I’d settle for the wolverine, at least they are a Western Palearctic species, but it does seem to indicate the sightings may have been a bit more vague than I’d been led to believe.
As well as following me to Hartlepool, big black cat sightings also managed to follow me on holiday. Whilst visiting Kintyre, we were talking to a local couple about the wildlife there and they told me about a couple of sightings of big black cats their family had had near the village of Tarbet. The husband’s had been a close range sighting of a black cat, bigger than an alsation whilst their son had had a vaguer night-time sighting whilst camping. I think I’ll go to Newcastle next time, not much chance of a Black Cat there. For those of you who saw the Tyne Tees documentary on the Durham Puma, I was very interested in the photo that Philip Nixon had taken of the alleged big cat running away with a rabbit in its mouth. I had seen a grainy version of this previously and had just dismissed this as being a fox. However pausing the video, and looking at it in more detail it was soon obvious that it was a cat, as its legs were far too thick to be a fox. Nigel Dunstone's conclusion had been that it was just a large feral cat. I would certainly agree that its legs appeared too short for it to be a lynx, but wondered if that could that have been an effect of the camera angle. Looking at it in detail its ears appeared to be tufted and it seemed to have a bit of a ruff around its neck, both lynx features whilst its legs appeared too thick to be domestic cat. Even more convincing, its ground colour was that reddish- yellow colour that is characteristic of lynx, but isn't found in any domestic breed of cat. Also the cat appeared to have spots on its back, again not found in domestic cats, except some of the leopard cat hybrids, but a lynx characteristic. So, in conclusion, we had a lynx shaped cat, which had the fairly unique colour pattern of a lynx; would someone like to tell me why it wasn’t a lynx ?

 The Big Cat Diary – Summer 2005
I’ve had two reports passed on to me recently by Gerry White. The first relates to about five years ago and was on a side road near Blanchland. The sighting was by a countryside worker who had previously been very skeptical of big cat stories; that is until a large cat with tufted ears and a short tail walked across the road in front of him.
The second report is recent/ongoing. There have been a number of sightings of a big, black cat in the Iveston/Delves Lane area. Added to this a roe deer carcass has been found which has had its head licked clean of hair, which is something only a cat would do. There have also been a number of sheep kills in the area which the farmer had attributed to dogs until recent events. Gerry didn’t have any more details at present, but apparantly the evidence was sufficient to get even get Eddie Bell to reconsider his opinion that there aren’t any black panthers out there. I look forward to hearing how this one pans out.
I’ve finally got round to putting the “big cat” records that people have been passing on to the newsletter onto a spreadsheet. There are over 30 of them, plus I’m sure I’ll have a few more laid around on scraps of paper, however I know that this is just the tip of the iceberg as I only have a few sources of information and there will be many more reports that I don’t get to hear of. I’ve attached a summary of the records below to give people a rough idea of where the records have come from and what they seem to be describing. As there isn’t room here to print all the fields and so let you make up your own mind, I’ve divided the reports into two categories. Category A records are basically those where a big cat is the only reasonable explanation. That isn’t meant as a reflection of the recorder’s reliability, but rather reflects the circumstances of the record; it could well be that all of the records below are of alien cat species as I do screen out any reports that I’m sure don’t refer to big cats. As with all wildlife records, its always a work in progress, so please feel free to let me know any additions or amendments. A full copy of the database can be obtained from me, minus the recorder’s name for reasons of confidentiality.

October 2004
The Black Labrador (sorry Big Cat) Diaries This edition, I fear I am in danger of breaching the credibility barrier. Having had big cat records at Castle Eden Walkway and Stillington where I previously worked, they now seem to have followed me to Hartlepool; it is getting a bit embarrassing.
This latest record is also significant for another reason, as it would involve breeding, which in turn involves more than one big cat in the area.
The sighting was on 11th August, by someone who I think I could fairly describe as a knowledgeable countryman, and was in a secluded valley near an area of dense, semi-ancient woodland in the north of Hartlepool. The gentleman in question was sneaking up to a rise in the ground alongside the wood, in order to try and show his grandchildren some rabbits. As he got to the top of the rise, he saw a large black animal (about the size of a Labrador!) with a long tail, get up and slip into the wood. This was followed by a small, black animal, the size of a domestic cat. He was sure that both animals were cats. I paced the distance out and they had been no more than 40 metres from the observer. We searched for signs but there were few opportunities for leaving footprints and the barbed wire on the fence was high up and so hadn’t snagged any fur. Within the wood, there was an interesting footprint which had a suitably broad heel pad and which showed no claw marks, but it was obscured by another footprint and so was inconclusive.
This is the first record that I have received that implies a mother and cub. The only livestock in this area is dairy cattle and wild prey would be fairly limited as it is only a smallish wood, so I would anticipate that they would move on once the cub was more mobile.
Another sighting occurred in early September, about 3 miles further south near the extensive woodlands at Wynyard. A walker had been very shaken up when he came across a large black cat, which he described as 4 feet long and the height of an Alsation (I’m sure he meant Labrador). The animal was only 20-30m away and was walking away from him (or he’d have been even more shook up) and heading for one of the large blocks of woodland.
I’m also told (though third hand) that there’s a farmer on the nearby A689 who has been losing lambs unaccountably and finding sheep up trees. He may just have very athletic sheep with a poor sense of direction, but I can think of another explanation.
Finally, just to round up other bits and pieces of records, I’m told that keepers in the Thimbleby area of North Yorkshire have seen a large black cat on several occasions and that a farmer’s wife from there had a close encounter with the same (and yes, she had a couple of Labradors with her at the time). Also Kevin O’Hara tells me that there is a very, very large black domestic cat roaming the Seghill area, which might account for one of the potential big cat sightings in the last edition. Still, with Kevin being a Sunderland supporter, there is at least one genuine big, black cat roaming around up there.

The Big Cat Diary
The sighting of a big black cat and cub in the north of Hartlepool, mentioned in the last edition of the Big Cat Diary, was picked up by the Hartlepool Mail which ran an article entitled “The big cat’s lair – What experts say on trio’s sighting”. The people who saw the cat were quoted as saying “the adult cat was completely black and slightly bigger than a Labrador dog but much longer” and “They were definitely pumas because they had really long tails and moved like cats”. You may recall that they saw the animals in the open from less than 40 metres. It then quotes Eddie Bell, police wildlife liaison officer and long-term big cat investigator in the following extract: “Animal expert Eddie Bell doubted the trio’s suggestions that the creatures could be pumas. He said “Because of the size and colour of the cats they could not be pumas. Pumas are brown in colour and the animals are too small in size to be leopards or panthers. They are likely to be feral cats which can grow to the size of Labradors. Its always possible that they have seen a Muntjac deer which would not look like anything they have experienced before. These deer are moving into our area and have been described as looking like dogs, pigs and cats. They are brown in colour and could appear black in bushes. But it is more likely they have seen a big black feral cat”.
The article prompted a number of people to come forward with other, earlier sightings. The best of these was a letter to the Mail from someone relating an incident of 18 years ago, when he was a young press photographer. He was travelling from Trimdon to Elwick when a huge black cat walked quickly across the road in front of him. Certain that it was a panther, he stopped the car hoping to see it going across the field. As he couldn’t see it he got out and ran across the road for a better look. After watching for about a minute, he was just turning back to the car when he glanced down and saw that the big cat was laid in the ditch right next to where he was stood. The man gradually backed off and slowly got back into his car. As he had only been a matter of feet from the cat, he was sure it was a black panther and not anything else. When he told his story at the time he was ribbed by colleagues, particularly because as a press photographer he had been too shocked to take a photo.
Interestingly the above correspondent also mentions that at that time there had been a spate of incidents involving mysterious black cats in that area. I was also told, by Hartlepool countryside warden Robert Smith that about 5 years ago there was a clutter of big cat reports around the nearby village of Hart. At around this time a local farmer saw a large black cat, bigger than a Labrador, eating cat food just outside his window. Earlier in the day his dog had ran into the yard, as it did out of habit every day, but this time came racing back with a cut across its nose. The farmer hadn’t thought much of this until his encounter with the big cat that night.
A more recent sighting, Spring 2004, was made by an experienced naturalist on the Seal Sands road, just south of Cowpen Bewley Woodland Park at Billingham. This is still only about 5km due south of Elwick. Driving along the road at 7.30am, a large, black animal ran across the road in front of him and disappeared down the embankment into a patch of reeds. The sighting happened too quickly to register much; the most noticeable feature being that it had a very deep chest. He was fairly convinced that the animal was a large cat. The only other possibility he could think of, from the shape of the chest, would be a big, black lurcher. It occurred to me that a lurcher would be unlikely to dive for cover in a patch of reeds, but I suppose it can’t be ruled out.
Finally, Tyne Tees Television have made a documentary on the Durham Puma (I think I only have 3 recent sightings of alleged pumas; by far the majority of my records are of alleged black panthers). It features Nigel Dunstone from Durham University who is an acknowledged authority on big cats world-wide. The programme is due to go out in March.

Ian Bond

ps I am thinking of launching a competition for anyone who can provide me with proof of any of the following fabulous beasts: a feral cat the size of a Labrador, a muntjac with a long tail; a non-human primate around any large water body in Northumberland (I’m not too fussy which species of primate as long as it is over 8’ tall and has big feet). I would possibly accept a wolverine in Weardale or even a 30’ Anaconda; unfortunately I can’t accept pine marten in North Yorkshire, as they are just not cryptic enough anymore.

 July 2004

There have been a number of reports of “big cats” lately. I have still got to chase up the details on some of them, but they all help piece together the picture that we are trying to obtain of the status of alien felines in the north east. I was looking at the first edition of the “Big Cat diary” the other day and noted that I launched it in the hope that we would get enough evidence to establish that they did exist. Whilst not everyone will be convinced without hard evidence, personally I have no doubt that there are at least two or three big cats out there, and possibly some small and medium sized alien moggies as well. For me the question is what is their current status and what part, if any, are they likely to play in our future fauna. Of course not every report of a big cat actually is of a big cat and consequently not everything that is reported in this column is necessarily a valid big cat sighting. Nevertheless, it is difficult to find an alternative explanation for some of the reports and taken together they will hopefully form a pattern.
The first two reports are first hand and I’ve left them just as they were reported to me.
“I saw a black cat about the size of a small Labrador dog on the 18th of January at about 7:15am. It was a very frosty morning and the field was white with frost. At first I thought it was a fox as I have seen a fox regularly in this area, but when I looked again I saw the tail was thin and it was completely black and moved like a cat. It turned to look at me, and my German shepherd dog and made off towards the trees in the corner of the field. I was walking along a railway line that runs from Seghill to Backworth and the animal was in a field beyond a pond on the west side of the railway about a hundred yards from me. (NZ 27/37) 29.7 - 73.9 To be honest I was a bit frightened to tell any body it case they thought I was mad, but I am sure it was a large cat.”
Bill Thompson
“At the end of last year, I was travelling on the Newcastle-Hartlepool railway line. Looking out of the window of the train I spotted a creature slowly moving in front of a line of shrubbery with its head down to the ground. It was the traditional “black” colour and the size of a big cat, ie larger than an alsation, and longer too, tail curving off the floor. I was stunned, as you don’t expect to see such things. I had to react quickly because I was on a moving train, so I first tried to gauge the reaction of other wildlife to its presence. There were horses in the same field and they were all at the opposite end (ie against the railway line and our train) although they didn’t appear to be panic stricken. So my second reaction was to have it confirmed by someone else. Unfortunately my daughter was looking in the other direction and I wouldn’t have had time to explain it to her before we had passed the field. So I had no other witnesses and I didn’t discuss it with anyone, as they’d have thought I was a nutter. I did consider contacting an urban farm that was just to the south of the field but thought better of it.
I don’t know if this comes under Tyne & Wear or County Durham as its an area I am not familiar with. I should also add that I couldn’t see eyes or ears although it was in profile. (Hope you don’t think I’m making this up)”
Iris Ryder
I was contacted recently by someone from ITV, who is considering making a short documentary on big cats in the north-east. This follows on from her own sighting, in April this year, of a big, blackish cat, seen from the A1 about 7 miles north of Darlington. This puts it close to Bishop Middleham where a similar creature was sighted last October. She was sure that other people must have seen it, but no-one else seems to have reported it (at least not to Eddie Bell and certainly not to me).
The most recent report again comes from my trusty correspondent, Kevin Bulmer and is again based around the Guisborough area (I’m so pleased NMG covers Guisborough). He was walking his dogs in Guisborough Woods where he met a family who had just been out walking in the woods, when what should cross their path but a big black cat. Fearing a colossal amount of bad luck, they turned round and headed home. They had a couple of Labradors with them and described the cat as being the size of the Labradors. This confirms one pattern that I was suspecting, lots of reports of big cats seem to mention Labradors. (But is this statistically significant, I ask myself?)
Finally, my usual plea for people to send in any information they have on big cat sightings (with or without Labradors). Who knows, they might even feature it on the telly!

Summer 2002

After a run of big, black cats in Northumberland and assorted lynx, it is with great pleasure that I can announce the return of the Durham Puma. According to the Northern Echo, who ran the story in July, two boys out walking their dog at Scar Top, Barnard Castle, had a brief sighting of an animal, which they described as the size of a big cat such as a puma. They only caught a glimpse of it before it ran off into woodland. No further details were mentioned, so there was nothing to say that it actually was a puma (except that it was in Durham so it must be, mustn’t it?) Judging by the response in the letters page of the Echo, people would have been more inclined to believe the Return of the Pink Panther.

I’ve had two other big cat reports recently, one of them in response to an earlier article. (someone is reading this then; Yes!)

I was interested to read about a dark grey animal sighted near Stocksfield in the spring newsletter. I think that I may have seen a similar animal between Hexham and Haydon Bridge at ~7.30am on 23rd February this year. I was travelling on the train to Carlisle and caught a glimpse of a uniform grey animal less than 20m away. At the speed of the train I only saw it for a couple of seconds but against the lying snow it was clearly grey, larger than a typical