Phantom cats in Scotland

[Big Les]

I avoided creating a specific thread from the old Loch Ness one, because many of the arguments on both sides were applicable across cryptozoology as a whole. But here's a nice specific "oh noes big catz!!!11!!" newspaper article, based on a recent FOIA enquiry. The resources apparently being squandered on this nonsense (helicopters are not cheap to operate!) make me quite sick:

http://scotlandonsunday.scotsman.com/scotland.cfm?id=421482007

This quote from what I like to call a "properzoologist" is my favourite:

"I've heard of people accumulating evidence in their freezers at home. But so far no-one has come forward. Until we get hard evidence it's impossible to say conclusively whether there are big cats are in Scotland," said Kitchener.

"We keep hearing about these bodies, which later disappear. Any footprints we've examined have always had a different explanation, often that of a dog.

"I've read newspaper reports of alleged big cat sightings. But people are actually describing the Scottish wild cat. They don't realise the animal is significantly bigger than the domestic cat.

"I am not suggesting that people are making this up. But it's difficult for people to accurately identify animals when looking at them in the distance in the dark."

If we get any interest in a general discussion on whether there are significant numbers of exotic cats running wild in the UK (or any other country), I'll dig out the relevant bits of the old thread.

 

[J. Arthur Hastur]

I know that blather.net used to post giant 'moggie' sightings in Ireland, or ABC's (Alien Big Cat) I was always mystified about these articles.

If I saw a giant cat, I think I could get a clear picture of it. These first hand sighting articles always seemed to have blurry photos of the neighbors garbage cans, or no picture at all, even though eye-witnesses often stated that the ABC had hung around for a half an hour, or came back at similar times each day.

I'll believe it when I see a picture.

 

[William Parcher]

Good arguments were given on this in the Loch Ness thread here. That thread should have been split when it diverted. There is much information on UK big cats there. Notice that the woo big cat believers in that thread are also Bigfoot woos.

The phantom cat, Nessie & Bigfoot themes can be evaluated in very similar ways.

 

[J. Arthur Hastur]

The phantom cat, Nessie & Bigfoot themes can be evaluated in very similar ways.

If you believe in them, squint really hard and hold your breath until you're about to pass out, then they appear?

 

[Big Les]

Good arguments were given on this in the Loch Ness thread here. That thread should have been split when it diverted. There is much information on UK big cats there. Notice that the woo big cat believers in that thread are also Bigfoot woos.

The phantom cat, Nessie & Bigfoot themes can be evaluated in very similar ways.

Yes, it should have been split then. I didn't start my own thread then precisely because all the arguments were interchangeable regardless of the unlikely gribbly monster at hand. Not just big cats and bigfoot, but also Nessie, and no doubt others too. This struck me as particularly interesting in light of the obvious question "what's the harm?". Well, spending a fortune on searches and wasting police (and everybody else's) time is "the harm".

 

[J. Arthur Hastur]

It's sort of like crying wolf. Every time you call out the police to investigate an ABC sighting, you obviously waste resources that could be used to stop or solve real crimes.

Most woo's don't seem to want to admit to this sort of resource wasting foolishness. How about instead of making another inconclusive bigfoot documentary we give that money to the Red Cross.

 

[William Parcher]

Thankfully we don't have government involvement in Bigfoot searches here in North America. The belief of Bigfoot is almost entirely 'harmless' in all respects. My only concern is the potential effect on children and young people if they are exposed to the anti-science & anti-government themes that are often associated with Bigfootery. People will raise their children however they choose to, but exposure to that kind of thinking from an authority figure can lead to later problems.

 

[Soapy Sam]

An adult male Scottish Wildcat (Felix sylvestris) can be over a metre from nose to tailtip. I only ever saw one once in the wild, in heavy woodland. It was very hard to judge scale as it was well camouflaged against dead grass and bracken and I saw it for about five seconds. The bushy, ringed tail was a giveaway, but that may be less obvious with domestic hybrids.
It was aware of me as soon as I saw it and vanished within seconds. I have a photograph of a blurred fern. These cats are quick.
This was an early summer evening.
In half dark, it would be extremely easy to misjudge it's size.

There is nothing imaginary about wildcats, though sadly they are very rare and there are probably few non-hybrid ones left.

I suspect most so-called "puma" sightings are either wildcats , or wildcat / domestic cat hybrids. The creatures are elusive and rare. Few people will see them even once in a lifetime. Very easy to exaggerate the size.

A couple of beers beforehand do not help.

I'd be more impressed if we had a few confirmed sightings from gamekeepers who are both in a position to see such cats fairly often- and have the knowledge to identify a cat as something non-native.

 

[William Parcher]

It's sort of like crying wolf. Every time you call out the police to investigate an ABC sighting, you obviously waste resources that could be used to stop or solve real crimes.

The UK cops apparently think there is merit to the sightings. Possibly the searches are done for political reasons, as law enforcement does have a need to protect people from various harms. Real big cats represent a potentially dangerous situation. But like Bigfoot, they apparently are harmless to those who do encounter them.

Most woo's don't seem to want to admit to this sort of resource wasting foolishness. How about instead of making another inconclusive bigfoot documentary we give that money to the Red Cross.

See, Bigfootery is a voluntary cultish hobby for people. All of the BF books, documentaries, searches, etc. are privately-funded. There is one known exception. Jeff Meldrum of Idaho State University has received (matching) funding from ISU for Bigfoot research.

I understand what you are saying about donating money to charities instead of making a BF documentary. But people are going to feed their hobbies and intrigues no matter what. You could say that the guy who pays many thousands of dollars for his radio-controlled plane could instead give the money to charity.

Much of the Bigfoot propaganda is for sale and is for profit. The various Bigfoot societies (they have websites) seem to mostly be non-profit local clubs.

Many Bigfooters feel that our government should fund organized searches. They are often also distrustful of government and will say that it intentionally ignores the Bigfoot phenomenon. There are stories of government conspiracies to cover-up the existence of Bigfoot. They often think that the lumber industry is behind all of it - the thinking being that if BF is confirmed, the Feds will be forced to cease logging in vast areas to protect the animal. The Feds cower to the hulking cash cow powerhouse of the logging industry and thus wouldn't dare allow any confirmation. Actually, there's a whole range of BF & Government conspiracy theories. Some involve BF bodies being confiscated by Men In Black, sightings of black helicopters and covert ops with unmarked 4-wheel drives descending on BF occurances, tapped phone lines, etc.

 

[J. Arthur Hastur]

I wonder if there is an Irish cousin to the Scottish Wildcat. And if said cats exist, why all the fuss over sighting them?

 

[Big Les]

Interesting comparative stuff from you William Parcher - I like your term "bigfootery" in particular!

I initially discounted the idea that this was akin to the police being compelled to investigate "leads" from psychics, simply because they have to investigate any and all leads due to the high stakes involved. In fact, I think it's not so different; if the police failed to identify and track down a potentially dangerous alien animal, they would be held responsible. As such, and because a handful of large cats have actually been found in the past, they can't dismiss eyewitness reports out of hand.

Either way, it's ammo for the woos to pursue their bigcattery.

 

[kitakaze]

I have plenty of ABC sightings every time I feed my son. Speaking of bigfoot/gribblies in the UK let's not forget there's no shortage of British bigfoot sightings. That dang gigantopithecus sure got around.

http://www.britishhominidresearch.co.uk

 

[J. Arthur Hastur]

Giant man-apes in the UK? Conservatives?

 

[Deus Ex Machina]

An adult male Scottish Wildcat (Felix sylvestris) can be over a metre from nose to tailtip. I only ever saw one once in the wild, in heavy woodland. It was very hard to judge scale as it was well camouflaged against dead grass and bracken and I saw it for about five seconds. The bushy, ringed tail was a giveaway, but that may be less obvious with domestic hybrids.
It was aware of me as soon as I saw it and vanished within seconds. I have a photograph of a blurred fern. These cats are quick.
This was an early summer evening.
In half dark, it would be extremely easy to misjudge it's size.

They are very difficult indeed to come across. My two sightings have both been fleeting moments of a few seconds and only the fact that I knew what they looked like enabled me to identify them.

I doubt sincerely that the reports would be from people seeing a wildcat and mistaking it for something else, the animals are extremely rare. Both the sightings I had were in National Forest areas of the Cairngorms and extremely remote. You are not going to run into one round by rubbish bins on a council estate in Dundee.

But I reckon you are totally correct about misjudging - with a half light at dusk or around dawn, tricky scenery it is very easy to misjudge size.

There is nothing imaginary about wildcats, though sadly they are very rare and there are probably few non-hybrid ones left.

check out the tail..

Gotta love 'em.

Sad indeed if they are allowed to disappear

 

[Soapy Sam]

I wonder if there is an Irish cousin to the Scottish Wildcat. And if said cats exist, why all the fuss over sighting them?

Never heard of wildcats in Ireland .
There's this though- (note date) http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/northern_ireland/3188085.stm

There have been cases of people releasing pet big cats in the UK. Nothing paranormal here- just some damn fool who brings in an animal then lets it go when it ceases to be cute. Most such animals would be expected to be killed on roads, or to starve to death, but there's no reason in principle why one should not prey on domestic animals. The question of how long it could survive in a densely populated country is interesting.

While I'm sure most "sightings" are simple mistakes, I see no reason why some of the stories may not be real. This is not cryptozoology. No one is saying these are native big cats- merely isolated cases of released species.

The latest exotic beast to escape is a beaver. We're all doomed!
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/help/3681938.stm

I doubt sincerely that the reports would be from people seeing a wildcat and mistaking it for something else, the animals are extremely rare. Both the sightings I had were in National Forest areas of the Cairngorms and extremely remote. You are not going to run into one round by rubbish bins on a council estate in Dundee.

Agreed- though a few events of the last few years led me to suspect wildcat / domestic hybrids are considerably commoner than they were.

The recent sightings in Fife are near reforested areas where I have been told by a forester that he has seen Wildcats twice in the last decade- though he did not think they were breeding locally, but making occasional forays.

I'd love to think they are making a slow comeback. Far more interesting than the odd imported megamoggy.

 

[Peter@Beoworld]

My sister has a farm - well she did till the end of last year - and they had a spate of sheep killings which were put down to a big cat - they were based just outside Chipping Norton in Oxfordshire. They did have someone from the Ministry around - the remains were said to be typical of a big cat kill - not a lot left and often hidden - and there were spoor signs. My brother in law dusted down his trusty rifle but never saw anything and the killings stopped.
I would agree that some poor big cat had been abandoned rather than a pride of lions were roaming around Oxfordshire though!

 

[kittynh]

Wow, the Scottish wildcat is so beautiful.

We have fisher cats. The few times I've seen them, usually at dusk or early morning, I think they are HUGE! I mean they are all FUR and with a big tail and I think they are the size of a HUGE DOG, like some sort of GIANT WEASEL OF DEATH!!!

They really aren't. But they are so uncommon they seem BIG. They are bigger than a cat, yes. And they are very very furry in the winter.

But they aren't as big as my eyes tell me they are!

 

[Big Les]

Never heard of wildcats in Ireland .
There's this though- (note date) http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/northern_ireland/3188085.stm

There have been cases of people releasing pet big cats in the UK. Nothing paranormal here- just some damn fool who brings in an animal then lets it go when it ceases to be cute. Most such animals would be expected to be killed on roads, or to starve to death, but there's no reason in principle why one should not prey on domestic animals. The question of how long it could survive in a densely populated country is interesting.

While I'm sure most "sightings" are simple mistakes, I see no reason why some of the stories may not be real. This is not cryptozoology. No one is saying these are native big cats- merely isolated cases of released species.[/quote]

All true, needless to say. We covered this pretty well in the thread linked above. It's not cryptozoology when you are claiming that a few animals have escaped over the last 40 years. But you miss the point slightly in that the cryptozoologists are claiming or implying that there are many more cats (c40 according to the guy in the article, c50 suggested by Carcharadon in the other thread) than the known isolated cases would account for. In other words they are saying that a significant number, if not most of, the recording sightings were indeed of alien big cats. I can only speculate as to why they choose to believe this, but imagine that it's for the same reasons other woos do - because it makes them feel special and their lives and the world at large feel that bit more unknown and exciting.

To put it another way, the ABC schtick is somewhat like the world of urban myths - no doubt somewhere someone has spat in fast food and served it customers. But email forwards notwithstanding, there is no current phenomenon that warrants anyone panicking or boycotting a certain outlet. Same thing here - some genuinely big and exotic cats have turned up in the UK, but it is very unlikely that there are ANY actively breeding groups out there, let alone a population totalling of 40-50.

The latest exotic beast to escape is a beaver. We're all doomed!
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/help/3681938.stm

Must...resist...obvious....gags...!!!

Agreed- though a few events of the last few years led me to suspect wildcat / domestic hybrids are considerably commoner than they were.

The recent sightings in Fife are near reforested areas where I have been told by a forester that he has seen Wildcats twice in the last decade- though he did not think they were breeding locally, but making occasional forays.

I'd love to think they are making a slow comeback. Far more interesting than the odd imported megamoggy.

I agree; I made the point on that Loch Ness thread that surely native British wildlife is wonderful enough. But clearly feral cats and even the Scottish Wildcats are not what the majority of cat-spotters and the public have in mind when they say "big cats". They mean leopards, puma, lions etc - things that could have your arm off. That's kind of the point for them I think; on some level they thrill to the idea that in our relatively safe British countryside, you might get more than just a little pussy.

(Sorry! It was the beaver thing...I had to get it out of my system. Won't happen again!)

 

[J. Arthur Hastur]

Never heard of wildcats in Ireland .
There's this though- (note date) http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/northern_ireland/3188085.stm

There have been cases of people releasing pet big cats in the UK. Nothing paranormal here- just some damn fool who brings in an animal then lets it go when it ceases to be cute. Most such animals would be expected to be killed on roads, or to starve to death, but there's no reason in principle why one should not prey on domestic animals. The question of how long it could survive in a densely populated country is interesting.

While I'm sure most "sightings" are simple mistakes, I see no reason why some of the stories may not be real. This is not cryptozoology. No one is saying these are native big cats- merely isolated cases of released species.

The latest exotic beast to escape is a beaver. We're all doomed!
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/help/3681938.stm

See? That's all perfectly reasonable. Why do people need to make it into a mystery? There goes my vactaion to Ireland, I have a peg leg...........

 

[Deus Ex Machina]

Never heard of wildcats in Ireland .
There's this though- (note date) http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/northern_ireland/3188085.stm

There have been cases of people releasing pet big cats in the UK. Nothing paranormal here- just some damn fool who brings in an animal then lets it go when it ceases to be cute. Most such animals would be expected to be killed on roads, or to starve to death, but there's no reason in principle why one should not prey on domestic animals. The question of how long it could survive in a densely populated country is interesting.

While I'm sure most "sightings" are simple mistakes, I see no reason why some of the stories may not be real. This is not cryptozoology. No one is saying these are native big cats- merely isolated cases of released species.

The latest exotic beast to escape is a beaver. We're all doomed!
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/help/3681938.stm




Agreed- though a few events of the last few years led me to suspect wildcat / domestic hybrids are considerably commoner than they were.

The recent sightings in Fife are near reforested areas where I have been told by a forester that he has seen Wildcats twice in the last decade- though he did not think they were breeding locally, but making occasional forays.

I'd love to think they are making a slow comeback. Far more interesting than the odd imported megamoggy.

I do hope they do make a steady comeback. Do you know if there are any plans around to safeguard the species? I hate to see a small but interesting part of the fauna of the UK just dwindle away.

It does remind me of when I used to go out to what's left of the fens to look for otters and saw more and more huge swimming rats. Coypu that had escaped off some fur farms. Ugly things I have to say. Also Thetford Chase at one time had a pretty healthy wild mink population - courtesy of escapees from Mink farms in Norfolk. Couldn't find a pine marten but no problem stumbling over mink.