BigCats
BigCats
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Pawprints 'belong to a dog'
Sue Newman
August 18 2006
The large pawprint and piles of faeces that were the only evidence of the mysterious black cat’s passage through the Ashburton District have been dismissed as the feet and the faeces of a dog.
MAF biosecurity investigation officer Caleb King said that conclusion had been reached after consultation with staff at Orana Wildlife Park.
When the print and droppings were reported to MAF last week, Mr King said his first reaction was that the animal was something other than a cat.
The pawprint came complete with unsheathed claws, typical of a walking dog, he said.
“A cat on the other hand has retracted claws, unless it is hunting.”
Final say in identifying the evidence lay with Orana Park, and spokesman Nathan Hawke said there was no doubt that the evidence was canine in origin, not feline.
“That’s not to say we do or don’t think there is something out there, it’s just that our only concrete evidence is of a dog. Most of our opinion on this has been philosophical, if it was a large cat could it survive, and yes it could. It’s not our stance to debate if it is there or not,” Mr Hawke said.
Large black cat sightings were not rare and were not restricted to New Zealand, he said.
In what will be a disappointing turn for black cat hunters, MAF has decided to pull the plug on future excursions to the Ashburton District to check out sightings.
MAF had made several forays into the district over the years to check out reports of the black cat, but none yielded any evidence, Mr King said.
Future calls made to MAF about cat sightings will simply be entered into its database, and kept on file.
“Our brief is to protect New Zealand and we’ve investigated enough of these over the years to indicate going to the site and looking is really not that rewarding, we don’t find footprints or evidence at the places where people have seen it.”
Any future sightings of the cat should still be called into the MAF biosecurity line – 0800 80 99 66 - but unless there is overwhelming evidence of the animal, they are unlikely to spark a MAF investigation.
http://www.ashburtonguardian.co.nz/index.asp?articleid=7760
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The Year of the Cat.
Mercury Newspaper dated May 3rd, 2001.
The Sydney media at the weekend was again on safari, reviving tales of a 'panther' marauding through the Blue Mountains foothills and carting off stock and domestic animals. Could this be the 'Son of Tarana Tiger'?
Older readers of the Mercury will recall the exploits of 'The Tiger' some years back with the sighting of what witnesses describe as a 'black panther' killing sheep on properties between Tarana and Yetholme.
The Tarana Tiger became something of a local legend for months but the sightings ended after a landholder shot an unusually large black dog. Over the years there were other sightings of strange animals around the district.
But perhaps the most unusual was the one that took a little explaining. Years ago the column was at the old Lithgow police station in bridge street when an obviously startled traveler burst in. He blurted out to the desk sergeant that a short time earlier he and his family had pulled off the highway at South Bowenfels for a cup of tea and a nature break when they heard a frightening howling noise and saw a 'large black cat' staring at them before bounding away up the mountain. When he took police back to the location he pointed out a side track leading into the bush below Hassans Walls, opposite the Forty Bends.
The police found a pile of fresh animal bones, various tracks, and an unusual smell. And that was it.
There were no more sightings ever reported at that location so maybe that 'cat' was just as startled as the travelers who encountered it.
On the bright side we have no reports of local bush walkers being physically molested by anything more aggressive than the occasional Funnel Web spider or Tiger Snake. There was a tale of the Byng Bunyip, but that's another story?.!
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Nothing new in black panther sightings.
Mercury Newspaper "Your say" section - No date 2001.
Sir,
With something like the "panther" sightings stirring up interest there's always someone who comes out and says they've seen it before.
But I swear that about four or five years ago my partner and I were driving along Waratah Ridge on the Newnes Plateau when something large, black and cat-like leapt out of the scrub about 20 metres in front of us.
The creature turned it's head to look at us in mid flight, landed, spun 180 degrees and sped off back into the bush faster than anything I've seen. At the time we said it looked like a panther and I'd estimate it stood a gnat's hair under a metre tall at the shoulder, so if it was just a super feral cat, it was the mother of them all.
I also remember a reported sighting about 4 months later out the back of Baal Bone colliery (by one of the washery workers?), of a large "Puma" which drew the attention of news crews.
But as far as I know, the story never went to air? Then there's always the old stories of the "Tarana Tiger" which have been circulating for years.
Craig Flynn.
Lithgow.
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Australian Yowie Research - Data Base
www.yowiehunters.com
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Mystery footprints in the Kimberley; cat, creature or Yowie?
Thursday, 23 June 2005
Presenter: Vanessa Mills
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Footprints fuel speculation on big cats, creatures and beasties near Broome.
A series of unusual footprints found along a coastal creek, south of Broome, have got people speculating about what kind of creature made them.
The tracks were found near the Aboriginal community of Bidyadanga.
Residents have been spooked by the discovery, with people afraid to go fishing at night.
Superstitions and imaginations are in overdrive on the possibility of dragons, dinosaurs and escaped panthers.
The prints are large three toed pads, a bit like a cartoon cat paw, and reputed to be the size of a human foot if not larger.
There are several sets of tracks that walk out of the bush, down to Nabiru Creek and along the edge.
A number of locals have seen them, including police, teachers, and nursing staff. The Conservation Department couldn't identify the footprints from the photographs nor could track expert Barbara Triggs.
Barbara says the three toe pads are highly unusual and the only animal that has three toes is a bird. She speculates there might be different animals criss crossing the tracks, an animal walking in the same prints.
She says it is very hard to get an idea of the size of the prints from the photographs which were taken without a scale marker; she says to put a camera lens cap or a matchbox beside tracks, and to also take photos of the trail as a whole.
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'Panther' eludes expert stalkers
Jarrod Booker
Saturday August 19, 2006
The legend of the elusive panther-like creature roaming rural Canterbury is growing as animal experts join the search, but not even they have been able to solve the mystery.
For at least five years, the unusually proportioned animal or animals have been seen around the sparsely populated mid-Canterbury area, from the foothills to the sea.
Described as a large black cat, much bigger than a domestic cat, with a long tail, it is often seen slinking around on its belly and has an aversion to people.
Recent sightings prompted experts from Biosecurity New Zealand and Christchurch's Orana Wildlife Park to investigate in the area last week, but they didn't find it.
Biosecurity NZ believes it may be a particularly large feral cat, but Orana Park staff say it is possible the animal is a panther or big cat brought into the country before regulations were tightened.
Pawprints found in the area of one of the sightings were analysed by Orana Park staff this week and found to be that of a dog.
"It would be nice to get to the bottom of this. But I guess there is every possibility that we won't," says Biosecurity NZ senior adviser Sonya Bissmire.
Rangiora man Brent Thomas is one of those whose recent sightings prompted experts to travel to the area to investigate.
Mr Thomas was with his wife, Jill, and grandson Kahn, admiring the views from a lookout point near the mouth of the Ashburton River recently when he saw the animal in flattened-out grass on the edge of the river flats.
"It was not just a big black cat. I've seen wildcats before and it was something much more than that. It looked up at us and basically bolted. It was a very fleeting glimpse at best."
He likened it to the size of his golden labrador dog.
"I'm reluctant to use the word panther, because it sounds like you know what you are talking about. But I have never seen anything like it."
The local newspaper, the Ashburton Guardian, says the area has claimed the creature as its own.
"People who ring us with sightings are normal and sane people. They are not people given to flights of fantasy," says Guardian chief reporter Sue Newman.
Her son spotted the creature last year in a local walkway.
"He's done a lot of tramping and hiking and he's never seen anything like it before."
Orana Park animal manager Ian Adams says there are lot of theories about the animal.
It could be a zoo animal brought into the country that had escaped, or one or more large feral cats. A panther could survive in the harsh Canterbury winter by feeding on rabbits and birds.
"Anything is possible. I don't think we will ever get to the bottom of it until we have a body."
Ms Newman says interest in the creature has waxed and waned depending on the frequency of sightings, but the input of experts had added credibility and got people talking again.
People wanted to know what it was, but Ms Newman believes people would take exception to people going hunting for it.
"If someone came came across its carcass ... that would be different."
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10396958
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