Merged Alien Big Cats in the UK?

[Marduk]

Suit yourself. If you'd rather thrash around aimlessly than read posts that are trying to help you, that's up to you.




Yes, I get it. You've put in an FoI request for the reports by the Rangers who thought they saw big cats. Except that it might only be one, as the BBC report which quoted their spokesman only referred to one of the Rangers believing he'd seen a big cat.

What do you expect to get? It's possible that these "reports" were only verbal. Given that the incident already seems to have been the subject of an FoI request, and all that seems to have come out of that is a statement by a spokesman that yes, one of these men really believes he saw a big cat, I rather suspect that might be the case.

Suppose he wrote something down. I can't imagine that it will tell you any more than we already know. That one (or possibly two) Forest Rangers thought they saw something they thought was a "big cat" while using night-vision thermal imaging.

The fact that this has already been subject to FoI may be reason for them to refuse the request anyway.

Where do you think this is taking you? What reason do you have for believing there's any more to this than the usual mistaken-size sightings in poor visibility conditions, followed by the usual Chinese Whispers? If (as I suspect) you hadn't even thought about any of this until yesterday, don't you think it might be worth sitting on it for a while and thinking about the possibilities and probabilities in a sensible manner, rather than firing off FoI requests just because you read something on a fruitcake web site yesterday?

Rolfe.

okay then words of one syllable

me not make ask for wood man say in word
parch ask for wood man say in word
me just help parch
me like that
nice man
read parch ask
here

http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showpost.php?p=4951303&postcount=83

not my think to ask wood say in word
parcher think to ask wood man say in word

you think idea crap
why blame me
you blame parch
you not think right
you just blame

 

[William Parcher]

I don't even like the way these ABC loons debunk their own hoaxes. We get a "plush toy" explanation and shut your mouth if you want to know how they figured that out.

Here we have a "cardboard cutout" which was supposed to be the Beast of Bodwin Moor. Keep your mouth shut if you think it looks like a charcoal drawing instead of a photo of a cutout.

 

[shandyjan]

JCE is that a pic of your cat? It looks very big...again, nothing to compare it to in the photo.
Rolfe, been interesting reading your thoughts and the sharing of the parts concerning your job!

 

[William Parcher]

mog walk in woods
transmogrification
bloke see panther
presses stop
new headline
blimey
Marduk speaks

 

[Marduk]

I don't even like the way these ABC loons debunk their own hoaxes. We get a "plush toy" explanation and shut your mouth if you want to know how they figured that out.
.

http://www.bigcatsinbritain.org/englishnews960.htm

The 43-year-old amateur photographer from Upper Cwmbran said he spotted the animal while photographing a glamour model.
But yesterday the British Big Cat Society issued its "final verdict" on the photograph which has been examined by a zoologist and several photographic experts.
Danny Bamping, the society's founder and spokesman, has claimed the beast in the digital camera picture was nothing more than a 20 pound stuffed toy.
He says the animal's tail was arranged in such a way it looked broken in two places, the paws did not look genuine and a big feline would not allow a photographer so close. But Mr Evans has remained adamant the photograph is genuine.
After the picture was published, Chris Mosier, of Plymouth, a zoologist who has studied big cats for 15 years and has written two books on big cat sightings, cast doubt on it.
He said, "My opinion is that they are pictures of a toy and I recognise the toy used in the pictures as one you can buy for ?20 - a colleague sent me one from Scotland."
Mr Mosier's comments have now been followed by British Big Cat Society's final verdict being published on its website.
Mr Bamping said he also visited the scene where the photograph was taken but found no paw or scratch marks, or any smell associated with a big cat.
He said in a letter to Mr Evans, "After considering all of the above, I firmly believe that the photograph is actually of a large, stuffed 'cuddly toy' (full size) Black Panther. These are easily available from various sources.

I am outraged, where are the pictures of the glamour model.

 

[Marduk]

transmogrification

whut ?

 

[Marduk]

omg, girl attacked by the beast of Cwmbran in high street

 

[William Parcher]

They are saying it's a known full-sized stuffed panther toy that sells for 20 pounds?

 

[William Parcher]

That looks right. Send that pic to the loons. They need it on their site!

 

[Rolfe]

You probably already know this stuff. Canids do not have a killing bite, felids do. Canids have to tear, shake and pull until the prey succumbs to blood loss or shock. Their paws are useless for gripping large prey and so they literally hang on by their teeth alone. If they bite the throat, it could indeed "rip it out". It is rarely a quick death and feeding may begin before that. The big cats are set up to deliver a bite to the throat or skull that causes death without any tearing or pulling with the teeth. There seems to be an instinct directed towards crushing the trachea and maintaining it until suffocation. Their killing bite is not applied to anything other than the head and neck. The different species of big cat have slight variations on how they do the killing, but it's all the same theme. Hold on tight with the claws and direct your bite(s) at the neck/head. Attacking any other part of the body is a waste of time and is potentially dangerous. Your teeth are not designed to kill that way.

The canids grab almost anywhere with their teeth and pull/shake. If they grab the throat of a fleeing sheep, they may try to plant their feet which causes the struggling animal to rip its own throat by frantic pulling away.

Attacking the flanks or legs is just not what big cats do - it's what canids do. When in doubt - shave the carcass and look for penetrating claw marks.

The odd thing was, in our series of cases last year, we had two deaths that exactly fitted the pattern I bolded above. However, circumstantial evidence simply couldn't support a big cat being the cause. The shepherd was talking about badgers, but I found that a bit of a stretch too.

Then we had more deaths, in each case with a different area of the sheep being bitten, just one massive bite then nothing else. One gimmer lost all the muscle from one leg, leaving just a tibia. It was completely gruesome. These all suggested dog, and common sense says the whole lot were dogs, or probably a dog.

We still make jokes about the "Pentland Beast", but we know there's nothing with jaws that size living there, because every bloody lamb is tagged and counted and accounted for. My instinct says Rottweiler. However, if there's someone with an illegal pet leopard or cheetah around, who has only let it out twice, in the same week, on opposite sides of the Firth of Forth - well, that would make a good story too!

Actually, I usually skin the carcasses and look for the evidence of injuries from the inside out. I've seen a few where there were multiple teeth punctures on the hindquarters, apparently done as the lamb was running away.

Rolfe.

 

[William Parcher]

 

[William Parcher]

The odd thing was, in our series of cases last year, we had two deaths that exactly fitted the pattern I bolded above. However, circumstantial evidence simply couldn't support a big cat being the cause.

It's not so odd to find canid kills with only a mortal throat wound. It suggests a single attacker with some experience. Also suggestive of an attack scenario that allowed biting the throat as first and only traumatic contact.

 

[JcR]

JCE is that a pic of your cat? It looks very big...again, nothing to compare it to in the photo.
Rolfe, been interesting reading your thoughts and the sharing of the parts concerning your job!

Yes... and the "real terror" reveals itself when the sun dips below the horizon, and sends the moon adrift up into the night sky.

 

[William Parcher]

This image was presented as a photo of a cougar in Maine. I know we discussed it before but I can't find the thread. Many thought the image was altered.

 

[Hokulele]

Getting back to the OP.

In spite of the railway line, there aren't good size reference points in the film, the policeman was a fair distance away, and the resolution is very poor. I think, just as the news item said at the time, that it's very inconclusive. It still could be a black Lab, but I think it's more likely just to be a big black mog, maybe somebody of 6 kg or more. Trying to magnify it into a puma seems a bit of a stretch though.

Although Helensburgh is on the edge of the Highlands and the Loch Lomond Park, it's very civilised. It's posh Glasgow commuter belt. That's what the railway line is. It shouldn't be all that hard for someone determined in the area to find out what lives there that might have taken a little stroll on the tracks.

How difficult would it be for someone to place a reference object (moggie-sized) along the rails, then go back to the point where the original video was shot and shoot another video for comparison?

 

[Rolfe]

okay then words of one syllable

me not make ask for wood man say in word
parch ask for wood man say in word
me just help parch
me like that
nice man
read parch ask
here

http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showpost.php?p=4951303&postcount=83

not my think to ask wood say in word
parcher think to ask wood man say in word

you think idea crap
why blame me
you blame parch
you not think right
you just blame

You funny man!

Here Forest of Dean.

Five miles across. And not just one big cat is supposed to be living there, but several. They're breeding!

Without leaving the slightest trace on the ecosystem!

The Rangers were doing a deer census, remember. They keep records. They go there all the time. There are also sheep there, which belong to people, who tend to notice if a lot go missing.

WHAT ARE THESE CATS EATING??

WHERE ARE THE BODIES?

Could an area as small as that actually support a population of pumas even if the govenment decided it wanted to have them there? How soon before they ran out of prey?

Where are the bones and the skulls? Where are the ewes and hinds whose lambs and fawns have vanished?

Where are the tracks and the shed fur and the bodies of the cats themselves when they die?

There's no point in listing a handful or two of "maybe" sightings and a paw-print that could be a dog's. If there was even one adult puma in there, there would inevitably be stacks of evidence. With a whole population, you'd be tripping over them. The Rangers would be finding half-eaten carcasses on a weekly basis. There would be regularly-used trails, dens even. Visitors would be snapping pictures on their mobile phones. Farmers and shepherds would be complaining of devastating losses. Dead pumas themselves would be found from time to time.

This is Bigfoot in the back yard!

And because William, quite reasonably, asks what evidence you base your claims on, instead of thinking about whether or not what you've just sucked up from a woo-woo web site is credible, you abuse our democratic privileges and waste out tax money by firing of FoI requests.

You heap funny man.

Rolfe.

 

[Marduk]

You heap funny man!

Here Forest of Dean.

[qimg]http://www.vetpath.co.uk/jref/dean.jpg[/qimg]

Five miles across. .

http://www.royalforestofdean.info/forest-of-dean/

The Royal Forest occupies an area of 204 square miles in the western part of Gloucestershire.The 20 million trees that cover the Royal Forest of Dean include oak, beech, ash, birch and holly trees.

why are you so offended by the idea that I am attempting to find something that another poster requested ?
what does it have to do with you anyway

really, your arrogance is out of its box and its getting quite obnoxious. please attempt to control it
thanks

 

[Rolfe]

http://www.royalforestofdean.info/forest-of-dean/

why are you so offended by the idea that I am attempting to find something that another poster requested ?
what does it have to do with you anyway

really, your arrogance is out of its box and its getting quite obnoxious. please attempt to control it
thanks

That's the whole area designated with the "Forest of Dean" park status. It's not all forest though, the rest is mainly farmland and ordinary woods and stuff like that. And once you start considering that larger area, you have to contend with a lot of roads, farms, and several medium-sized towns. This isn't the Black Forest you know. Everything I said above still applies, just the same.

Part of what it has to do with me is that it's my tax money you've decided to squander in this wild goose chase. Not quite on an Iraq War scale, but it's still an expense.

I'll leave it to William to address your declaration that you're doing this for him (after you told him to scuttle off back under his bridge). However, do recall. You were the one who came here just copy-pasting stuff from a poorly-thought-out woo web site. When did you first access that site, anyway? Yesterday?

You backed off from some of their more preposterous claims, but latched on to a couple of instances where there seemed to be a little bit more evidence. However, even that was hearsay and third-hand, and you hadn't thought to question why there was no original documentation presented. William, quite reasonably, pointed this out.

So, instead of reassessing the credibility of the web site you were so interested in, you decided to invoke the Freedom of Information Act. In spite of the reports already accessible stating that that had already been done.

Sure, I suppose it's about 20p of my tax money. Be my guest.

Rolfe.

 

[zooterkin]

You heap funny man!

Here Forest of Dean.

[qimg]http://www.vetpath.co.uk/jref/dean.jpg[/qimg]

Five miles across. .

http://www.royalforestofdean.info/forest-of-dean/

The Royal Forest occupies an area of 204 square miles in the western part of Gloucestershire.The 20 million trees that cover the Royal Forest of Dean include oak, beech, ash, birch and holly trees.

That's rather misleading, The actual area of woodland is, according to wikipedia, somewhat smaller:

The area is characterised by over 110 square kilometers (42.5 sq mi) of mixed woodland, one of the surviving ancient woodlands in England. A large area was reserved for royal hunting before 1066, and remained as one of the largest Crown forests in England, the largest after the New Forest. Although the name is often used loosely to refer to that part of Gloucestershire between the Severn and Wye, the Forest of Dean proper has covered a much smaller area since mediaeval times

Regardless of the actual area, it is still a well populated region, and has many tourists in the holiday season. You've not addressed those parts of Rolfe's post, only picked on what you imagined was a mistake.

why are you so offended by the idea that I am attempting to find something that another poster requested ?
what does it have to do with you anyway

It's a public forum; do you not know how those work?

 

[Rolfe]

Getting back to the OP.

How difficult would it be for someone to place a reference object (moggie-sized) along the rails, then go back to the point where the original video was shot and shoot another video for comparison?

Not sure. You'd need to know more about the camera used to take the pictures, and the zoom factor used, I think. It's just silly season fluff journalism though, even Marduk has abandoned the Big Cat of Helensburgh. I doubt if anyone is sufficiently concerned about the pictures to bother.

Rolfe.