BigCats

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Created: 13 November 2005

They seek him here, they seek him there - that damned elusive panther

23May2003 AUSTRALIA:
By Stephen Gibbs.

After days of debate over pedophilia and terminal illness, the state's MPs yesterday turned their attention to dancing bears and a mysterious monster moggie.
Amid the controversy of lowering the age of consent for homosexual males and a trial of cannabis to relieve chronic pain, the Government announced it would fund a search for "the so-called elusive Lithgow panther". David Campbell, who covers for the Agriculture Minister, Ian Macdonald, in the lower house, told Parliament the Government had acted on a request by concerned Hawkesbury citizens to hunt down the beast. Earlier this month the citizens held a public meeting to discuss a March 20 attack attributed to the cat on 17-year-old Luke Walker at Kenthurst.
"In a terrifying struggle with the creature, Mr Walker received deep lacerations to his right arm," the Hills Shire Times reported on May 6. "Sightings of the monster cat have been reported in an area stretching from Galston to Pitt Town since the Kenthurst attack."
The Mayor of Hawkesbury, Rex Stubbs, told the Times: "I believe there is significant danger and something needs to be done."
Mr Campbell said that in the past 30 years there had been about 60 reports of a large, cat-like animal savaging livestock and humans in Sydney's west, north-west, the Blue Mountains and Lithgow. "It is a threat that NSW takes seriously," he told Parliament.

Outside, he said an inquiry last year by the Agricultural Protection Unit, National Parks and Wildlife Service, MossVale Rural Lands Protection Board, local governmentand Taronga Zoo had been unable to find conclusive evidence of the panther.
NSW Agriculture would now re-open its inquiries "without incurring major cost". That cost is believed to be several thousand dollars.
Asked whether taxpayers should be paying for the panther hunt, the Leader of the Opposition, John Brogden, said: "I think Amanda Fazio should give herself up," referring to the raven-maned upper house Labor MP. Meanwhile, the Greens held a press conference to announce the presence in Sydney of Maneka Gandhi, "one of the last two surviving members of India's famed Gandhi family".
Ms Gandhi, an MP in India and "recently voted India's most popular person by MTV India viewers", is here to raise money to save India's dancing bears. T he bears are made to dance for tourists after having their teeth removed and a rope run through their nose.

Source: SYDNEY MORNING HERALD 23/05/2003 P3

Hunt for mystery panther.

23May2003 AUSTRALIA:

The NSW Government has donned its safari suit and pith helmet again to begin another search for the mysterious Lithgow Panther after a teenager claimed he was mauled by an unidentified "monster cat". The panther, rumoured to stalk bushland near Lithgow in the Blue Mountains,has captured the imagination of NSW residents for three decades, with more than 60 sightings reported. The latest incident came two months ago when Luke Walker, 17, of Kenthurst, said he was attacked by a mystery animal.

Source: DAILY TELEGRAPH (SYDNEY) 23/05/2003 P2

NSW - Govt hunts the Lithgow Panther once more

22May2003 AUSTRALIA:

In an interview on Sydney radio 2GB, Dr Stubbs said the "Kenthurst Panther" had begun stalking less challenging prey. "The theory is that it's getting a little old and it's coming closer to human habitation primarily to track down cats and dogs and small farm animals," Dr Stubbs said. He said a cat's skull had been found with marks consistent with a panther bite and farm animals had been found up trees.
Opposition leader John Brogden seemed to think the government should begin the new search closer to home.

Asked what he thought of the elusive black cat, his thoughts turned to a Labor MP with a penchant for wearing black. "I think Amanda Fazio should give herself up," he said.

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Created: 13 November 2005

Big cats not a tall tale

By Eamonn Duff
November 2, 2003
The Sun-Herald

Big cat sightings and theories

A State Government inquiry has found it is "more likely than not" a colony of "big cats" is roaming Sydney's outskirts and beyond. The revelations are the result of a fresh four-month investigation into the "black panther phenomenon" which for years has plagued residents across Sydney's west, north-west, Richmond, the Blue Mountains and Lithgow.

While National Parks and Wildlife officials are yet to implement a positive course of action, a senior source confirmed last night a big cat expert had been contacted with a view to future work.

He said: "While we still haven't got conclusive evidence that the creature exists, compiled evidence points strongly to the fact that it does." The source added: "If and when an expert is commissioned, the first aim would be to identify exactly what sort of animal it is. The second would be to ascertain how many there might be."

Although big cat sightings across NSW date back more than 100 years, speculation intensified in May 2001 when a successful Freedom of Information request revealed the NSW Government had been maintaining a secret file on the creature.

It also revealed wildlife hierarchy were so concerned about the potential threat to humans that they commissioned big cat expert Dr Johannes Bauer to evaluate what had previously been deemed unthinkable. He concluded: "Difficult as it seems to accept, the most likely explanation of the evidence . . . is the presence of a large feline predator."

While conclusive proof has failed to materialise since, sightings have continued to flow in from bushwalkers, tourists and local residents, including a NSW police officer and a Qantas pilot.

When Kenthurst teenager Luke Walker suffered deep cuts in March this year and said they were the result of a terrifying struggle with a panther-like cat, the NSW Government reopened the case. The latest report, compiled by NSW Agriculture and obtained exclusively by The Sun-Herald, included a review of sightings and extensive interviews with residents of Grose Vale, where the creature has frequently been sighted.

It found that recent witnesses to big cat activity in NSW were highly credible. Also taken into consideration was a previous report by Dr Keith Hart, district veterinarian of the Moss Vale Rural Lands Protection Board, who, after testing scat samples, concluded a large cat was living in the Grose Vale area.

The report said: "Nothing found in this review conclusively proves the presence of free-ranging exotic large cats in NSW, but this cannot be discounted and seems more likely than not on available evidence." One theory the report refused to dismiss was that "historically, sightings in Eastern Australia occur in old gold mining areas and that anecdotal evidence suggests pumas [Felis concolor] were brought to Australia by American goldminers in the 1850s.

The report added: "These animals may have subsequently escaped or were released, causing numerous sightings over many years." Even as the Government was preparing to go public with its latest findings, a Central Coast family approached NSW Agriculture last month with claims that a huge black cat was "openly roaming" their newly purchased Mudgee weekend holiday home.

Speaking to The Sun-Herald, Chris, who refused to reveal her surname through fear of would-be hunters overrunning her property, said: "We've watched it stalk wallabies, we've seen it sitting high up in a tree. It roams around like a large family dog that thinks it owns the place." She added: "There is absolutely no disputing what it is. The kids are terrified and, to be perfectly honest, so are we."

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Australian Yowie Research - Data Base
www.yowiehunters.com

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Created: 13 November 2005

Mackenzie, New Zealand

17 Jul 1999

Reports of a panther-like creature roaming the Mackenzie Country have rekindled memories of a Christchurch woman's encounter with a big cat in the area. School teacher Marianne Daines says she was mountain-biking in Twizel three years ago when she saw what she thought at first was a big black labrador about 30m away.

"We've got a black lab, but then I realised it was the wrong shape and was moving differently. A dog and a cat run very differently."

Mrs Daines said she saw a man moving in the same direction and presumed he and the animal were together. She was commenting yesterday after two British tourists reported seeing a big, black cat-like animal on the Lindis Pass. Department of Conservation spokesman Richard McNamara said the sightings were probably of wild cats in the Mackenzie district which had proliferated since the release of the rabbit calicivirus.

© Copyright AYR
Australian Yowie Research - Data Base
www.yowiehunters.com

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Created: 13 November 2005

16 Jul 1999 N.Z: Caught on film - The Lindis pass panther

By Fea Sue.

Could a black panther be stalking the Lindis Pass? On Wednesday two British tourists saw what they believed was a big black cat-like creature stalking through the Mackenzie Country. Mark and Deb Greening were so concerned about the "very large black creature" they saw about 59km from Omarama, towards Queenstown, that they reported their find, with photographic proof, to Queenstown police on Wednesday night.

The pair were travelling towards Queenstown in their campervan when Mrs Greening saw the creature in the undergrowth. Curiosity compelled them to turn back for a closer look where, to their astonishment, the Greenings found themselves about 20 to 30m from what they thought was an extremely large cat. "It was the size of an Alsatian dog, but a bit longer in the body," Mrs Greening said yesterday. "I was curious - it was so big ... I thought in my mind: `Is that a cat?' It was just too big," she said. So was it a black panther? "It was the first thing that came to mind," Mrs Greening said.

They stood debating whether it was a cat before deciding to photograph it, by which time the creature had run off and was some 50m away. "We've just come from America where they have wild mountain lions ... we weren't even sure if such large cats were natural to the mountains here," Mr Greening said. An inquiry to a Queenstown visitor centre confirmed that large wild cats did not roam the South Island high country.

That prompted the Greenings to report their find to the police. "We were merely concerned for the local farmers and wanted to let them know (if it was unusual)," Mr Greening said. He conceded that the creature "could well have been a very, very large pet cat," but it seemed unlikely.

Queenstown police sent a fax about the sighting to the Omarama constable, who could not be contacted for comment yesterday. News of the sighting yesterday shocked and amused several locals. "Good God, I hope not," said Omarama Hotel owner Gloria Casserly. "I suppose stranger things have happened in Omarama."