Spookiest big cats rumoured to roam the UK as Demon of Dartmoor caught on camera
Rumours of big cat sightings are common across the UK countryside, from the Beast of Bodmin to the Demon of Dartmoor.
In the most recent report of a sighting, a terrified walker was convinced he saw the huge animal roaming on Dartmoor moments before stumbling on a half-eaten deer carcass. Jon claims he even captured the beast on film in the Devon national park.
Jon says he and his family were so unnerved by the sighting they quickly left the area and won't go back. He says on their way back to their car they found the dead deer, only adding to their fears.
Jon, from Devon, said: "Whatever it was, my concern was that I didn't want it to come towards us. When I first saw it, I stopped straight away and told my family 'Don’t panic and stay where you are. I think there's a big cat or dog up ahead’.
“It just felt a bit surreal and quite strange that my first thought was 'big cat'. I managed to get my phone out and got a picture just in my hand before it walked along a bit and ran into the woods. "It had a huge tail, which must have been a metre long with some white on the end."
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There are thousands of reports that date all the way back to the 1940s, but some of the more recent sightings span from 2001. However, due to so many claims, experts are keen to prove whether or not they are real.
Such an example occurred in 2012, when a picture claiming to be the clearest ever of a big cat in Britain was fake. It was sent to the Centre for Fortean Zoology in Devon, and debunked by cryptozoologist Karl Shuker.
Experts found the photo, which shows the huge black cat lounging in the grass in Staffordshire, was actually taken from a now taken down website art.com. The exact location of where it was taken is unknown.
However, experts are confident that big cats do live among us, as Danny Bamping, from The British Big Cats Society, told MailOnline: "You can see it is photoshopped. I doesn't look real and it has that haze around it. Also why is there only one photo? If you have a cat sitting there you're not going to take just one photo.
"Our view is that there are big cats out there. A big cat is only a big cat if it has the ability to roar so that doesn't include pumas and lynxes. The evidence over the last 20 or 30 years points to the fact that there are big cats in Britain, around 70 per cent of these are largely big black cats."
One documentary now claims to have new DNA evidence proving the existence of at least one big cat in Gloucestershire, dating to July 2022. However, Danny says he's not convinced.
"I would be very sceptical about that," he added. "They are going to have to provide documentation of every step of the way."
Danny, who is working on a documentary called 'The Big Cat Flap', said that over the last 20 years, as many as 19 dead big cats have been found in the UK, estimating there are between 50 and 100 of the beasts living among us.
In one of the most recent sightings in 2013, residents in the small Scottish village of Brydekirk were left living in fear amid reports of a black leopard seen roaming the fields nearby. Preliminary findings by the Scottish Big Cat Research Team suggested the creature was in fact a black leopard.
Scientists plan to ‘de-extinct’ the Dodo and release it back into the wildPaul Macdonald, head of the team, said: "We are convinced it was a genuine report and that it is something of interest to us given the size of the cat and the description of it", adding to The Sun: "I've been involved in generating the national big cat mapping database and, essentially, we're at the stage now that we have 1,300 credible sightings mapped all over Scotland.
"It's difficult from any sighting to confirm if it's the same cat that's been mapped before – that in itself is difficult to say. A cat's life could span 12 to 15 years and that single cat could be responsible for one or 20 sightings."
Fast forward to 2016, and the police were called to Radcliffe, Manchester, following reports that a 'large cat' had been seen trying to hunt the animals in farmers' fields off Bury New Road. The caller said the creature was 'definitely not a dog and definitely not a cat' and was adamant that it was a black panther.
But the beast had supposedly vanished when officers arrived at the scene. A man from Misterton in North Nottinghamshire described seeing two ‘large, cat-like animals’ standing over his chickens in his garden in July 2022.
The full list of recent compelling sightings include:
- Brydekirk, Scotland, 2023
- Rhyl, Wales, 2022
- Misterton, Nottinghamshire, 2022
- Empingham, Rutland, 2021
- Hatfield House, Hertfordshire, 2018
- Treviscoe, Cornwall, 2016
- Radcliffe, Bury, 2016
- Galashiels, Scotland, 2015
- Kingston on Hull, 2013
- Embo, Scotland, 2011
- Newtown Cross, Hereford, 2009
- Helensbury, Scotland, 2009
- New Denham, Buckinghamshire, 2009
- Fife, Scotland, 2006
- Irvine, Scotland, 2001.