did I see an unusual fox??

[sunndog]

I didn't mean my alsation comparison literally. You all are right a fox could never outweigh an average German Shepard.
It was a frikkin enormous fox though.

As for judging the size of foxes I've shot many hundreds over the years in a professional capacity (the real figure might not be believed) so im more than confident in my judgements

 

[sunndog]

I am quite certain that there are big cats roaming the British countryside, I remember seeing photos in an old airgun magazine of footprints in the snow, clearly a cat, but big. However, I am equally certain that a lot of sightings are of dogs or domestic cats. So, when someone says they have seen a big cat, is one to believe them straight away, or is one to go through the range of other possibilities (even probabilities) first? If one believed every sighting, the place would have to be thick with black panthers (or bigfoots for that matter).

They thought they had found yeti foot prints in the snow and they turned out to be normal men prints that had melted and become huge.
I've seen it myself with fox tracks. The fox would have had to have been even bigger than a German Shepard lol

 

[santaman2000]

Where I live there are regular sightings of big cats... ie puma size........

I am quite certain that there are big cats roaming the British countryside, I remember seeing photos in an old airgun magazine of footprints in the snow, clearly a cat, but big. However, I am equally certain that a lot of sightings are of dogs or domestic cats. So, when someone says they have seen a big cat, is one to believe them straight away, or is one to go through the range of other possibilities (even probabilities) first? If one believed every sighting, the place would have to be thick with black panthers (or bigfoots for that matter).

The reason I know there are big cats round here is because I have come face to face wit a black puma. You do not forget those eyes glaring at you. Or the fact that you turn to jelly and almost wet yourself. I know the meaning of petrified! All ended well and it's too long a story for here but they are definitely here on the moor.........

There’s always confusion with terminology. Pumas (aka mountain lions, painters, and “panthers”) aren’t really big cats (I’m referring to their classification rather than their actual size) That said, they are the largest cat that isn’t classified as a “big cat.” The other confusion that occurs often is related to the various names I mentioned as what they’re called by. “Panther” is also another name for the smallest of the big cats, th Jaguars. It’s reasonably common for Jaguars to be black but very, very rare for a puma to be black.

All that in mind, if one of these cats running’s feral in the UK my money would be bet on the puma. The simple reason being the jaguar is a specialist species that only thrives in a jungle or similar environment whereas the puma’s native range extends over almost two full continents (North America and South America)
Mountains
Swamps,
Deserts
Jungles
Prairies
Eastern woodlands
Etc.

As well as adopting well to close human habitation.

 

[Robson Valley]

Puma = Mountain Lion = Cougar. They have been seen in my village.
It's an expectation that nobody lets their children walk home from school in the dark of winter.
Black bears come into town but no grizz that I know of.

Isn't there a good-sized wild cat in Scotland?

 

[C_Claycomb]

Hey Santaman2000,
Leopards are smaller than jaguars, and it is melanistic leopards that have been referred to as black panthers. (yeah yeah yeah, all from the genus panthera, the large felines that have different hyoid bones that allow them to roar...etc etc....) Since leopards and pumas are pretty close to a match on size it may be technically correct that pumas aren't "big cats", but from a conversational standpoint, being that correct would dictate that we describe pumas as large small cats .

In the UK, when talking about non-native-larger-than-tabby-puss cats, they all get bundled under the banner of "big cats", even if some of them don't roar, and might be no bigger than a bobcat.

For black cats, my money would be on black leopards, and I would not want to put money on there not being, now or in the past, some roaming around the British countryside. Black jaguars are fairly rare, and black pumas are so rare as to be practically mythical (despite various eye witness accounts), but black leopards turn up in zoos and private collections fairly often. Leopards live from the South African Cape up to Siberia, in every environment including big cities, even more adaptable than pumas, but tend to be a bit less secretive. If folk didn't keep saying the cats were black, I would be backing the idea of pumas too.

Chris

 

[C_Claycomb]

They thought they had found yeti foot prints in the snow and they turned out to be normal men prints that had melted and become huge.
I've seen it myself with fox tracks. The fox would have had to have been even bigger than a German Shepard lol

Good point. Snow didn't look melted, but it was a long time ago and I don't have the magazine any more. Could have been the case. Can't remember what the stride length was, don't recall it looking short for the size of print.

 

[C_Claycomb]

...

Isn't there a good-sized wild cat in Scotland?

It is possible there are no actual 100% Scottish Wildcats left. They have been interbreeding with feral domestic cats. Saw a news/documentary not that long ago and the numbers were very, very low.

 

[santaman2000]

Hey Santaman2000,
Leopards are smaller than jaguars, and it is melanistic leopards that have been referred to as black panthers. (yeah yeah yeah, all from the genus panthera, the large felines that have different hyoid bones that allow them to roar...etc etc....) Since leopards and pumas are pretty close to a match on size it may be technically correct that pumas aren't "big cats", but from a conversational standpoint, being that correct would dictate that we describe pumas as large small cats .

In the UK, when talking about non-native-larger-than-tabby-puss cats, they all get bundled under the banner of "big cats", even if some of them don't roar, and might be no bigger than a bobcat.

For black cats, my money would be on black leopards, and I would not want to put money on there not being, now or in the past, some roaming around the British countryside. Black jaguars are fairly rare, and black pumas are so rare as to be practically mythical (despite various eye witness accounts), but black leopards turn up in zoos and private collections fairly often. Leopards live from the South African Cape up to Siberia, in every environment including big cities, even more adaptable than pumas, but tend to be a bit less secretive. If folk didn't keep saying the cats were black, I would be backing the idea of pumas too.

Chris

Yeah. I had forgotten about Leopards.

 

[Joe tahkahikew]

Why the need to be patronising and dismissive? presumably you DONT live in a town or city? well bully for you .

Kwé
My English isn't that bad. My reply wasn't patronising or dismissive and wasn't meant to be. I said my experience of SOME of those people who spend most of their lives in towns & cities don't always judge size very will in the bush.

I don't know where you live. It matters not. I will say now that I wonder why if the animal you saw was wild cat big fox or even wolf. Why was it walking towards you? If you walk through woods you make noise and smell that any wild animal such as lynx, fox or wolf can pick up long before you can smell or hear him. Why not walking I away I wonder? Shame you didn't get picture.
Enju

 

[Toddy]

Good point about the smell. I can often smell the fox before I see it. I can smell where it's been too. That's a different sort of foxy smell, it's a kind of musty foxy smell, and if I look more closely I can often spot where the fox has slept (only vixens with cubs really use dens) curled up. It leaves a kind of cup shaped nest shape in the grasses round here. If it's been under the hedge there's a kind of vague hollow in the soil, and you can often spot hairs on the lower branches too.
Everything leaves traces

 

[sunndog]

Kwé
My English isn't that bad. My reply wasn't patronising or dismissive and wasn't meant to be. I said my experience of SOME of those people who spend most of their lives in towns & cities don't always judge size very will in the bush.

I don't know where you live. It matters not. I will say now that I wonder why if the animal you saw was wild cat big fox or even wolf. Why was it walking towards you? If you walk through woods you make noise and smell that any wild animal such as lynx, fox or wolf can pick up long before you can smell or hear him. Why not walking I away I wonder? Shame you didn't get picture.
Enju

No idea about big cats but foxes can be very bold/self absorbed/just not really care.
It's unusual but they will sometimes trot about in front of you in broad daylight.
I've found three asleep in the woods in the daytime and I stopped to watch and eventually they woke up had a stretch and sauntered off. If they haven't been shot at or chased by dogs in their lives they can be very confident indeed around humans.....like I say it's unusual but it does happen

 

[mr dazzler]

Kwé
My English isn't that bad. My reply wasn't patronising or dismissive and wasn't meant to be. I said my experience of SOME of those people who spend most of their lives in towns & cities don't always judge size very will in the bush.

I don't know where you live. It matters not. I will say now that I wonder why if the animal you saw was wild cat big fox or even wolf. Why was it walking towards you? If you walk through woods you make noise and smell that any wild animal such as lynx, fox or wolf can pick up long before you can smell or hear him. Why not walking I away I wonder? Shame you didn't get picture.
Enju

Thanks for the reply
Like I said, I was walking along a trail to shoot a stand of pine trees, and was focussed on that. I noticed a side path and As I glanced to my right to look along it as I passed theres the fox walking silently my way. That's the truth. We surprised each other. I saw him for a second or 2 then he simply disappeared silently, trotting back towards the road (which was less than 50 feet away). Have you known a dog on a HOT day to not be panting constantly? That fox was silent as a ghost
Don't forget, in over crowded overdeveloped Britain "wild" animals are becoming much more tamer, because they are compelled to adapt and be more used to human contact, and of course some dubious people regard them as pets that need looking after. I mean its like a comedy at times. I remember one day around 2010 sitting next to a stubble field producing charcoal drawings, and 4 or 5 deer were there at 10 in the morning bold as brass gleaning. At least 2 joggers came by, a cyclist, even 2 women on horse back, lots of light aircraft over Suffolk too...and PLENTY of motor vehicles, and those deer couldn't give a damn. I clapped my hands, no response, slammed the car door, even shouted...still nothing. Plenty of deer on the roadsides killed by cars though. Dial back to the 1970's, walking around Stang forest. You saw deer RARELY and if you did, one snapped stick underfoot would send them away in a hurry. Same with pigeons. Now they are obese little creatures who just sit around feeding on scraps of bread left out for them...and routinely get killed by neighbourhood cats (domestic) in my back garden. Mind you it always amazed me how much wheat was flying about in mid air, when you opened the crop of just one wood pigeon.

 

[mr dazzler]

No idea about big cats but foxes can be very bold/self absorbed/just not really care.
It's unusual but they will sometimes trot about in front of you in broad daylight.
I've found three asleep in the woods in the daytime and I stopped to watch and eventually they woke up had a stretch and sauntered off. If they haven't been shot at or chased by dogs in their lives they can be very confident indeed around humans.....like I say it's unusual but it does happen

I was once walking home along the Old Kent road around 1 am, and a fox (normal size) walked into the middle of the road, and stopped and looked at me, for a short while, then carried on, most likely to scavenge on the then derelict surrey docks. My neighbour in Bournemouth had 3 foxes use his drive way almost every day as a short cut, any time during the day, bold as brass, they'd even walk past if anyone else was in the drive.

 

[sunndog]

I was once walking home along the Old Kent road around 1 am, and a fox (normal size) walked into the middle of the road, and stopped and looked at me, for a short while, then carried on, most likely to scavenge on the then derelict surrey docks. My neighbour in Bournemouth had 3 foxes use his drive way almost every day as a short cut, any time during the day, bold as brass, they'd even walk past if anyone else was in the drive.

Wasn't there a case of an urban fox just walking into someone's house a while back and going upstairs....im sure it was in the paper

 

[mr dazzler]

LOL "Oi've read about people like him in the news of the world" There have been such reports. Many experts pooh pooh the idea that a fox would do that.

 

[sunndog]

Here's two occasions of foxes entering homes and actually attacking babies


https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&sou...Vaw3223Lzpgc1MTT-MMlzbh-3&cshid=1564476860668

 

[petrochemicals]

Wolf? Or some kind of wolf family thingy, after all beavers did mysteriously reappear?

 

[Laurentius]

Kwé
My English isn't that bad. My reply wasn't patronising or dismissive and wasn't meant to be. I said my experience of SOME of those people who spend most of their lives in towns & cities don't always judge size very will in the bush.

I don't know where you live. It matters not. I will say now that I wonder why if the animal you saw was wild cat big fox or even wolf. Why was it walking towards you? If you walk through woods you make noise and smell that any wild animal such as lynx, fox or wolf can pick up long before you can smell or hear him. Why not walking I away I wonder? Shame you didn't get picture.
Enju

I had a pet cat some time ago, and he was absolutely mahoosive, a maine coone and they are big. Well in his world there were urban foxes too. He certainly fought for dominance in our back garden with those raiding foxes. When it snowed and you looked at the tracks he made you would be thinking that was something bigger than a cat. He had a real reputation in our street as the boss cat and a fighter who was not neutered. He was nicknamed Burt Reynolds in the neighbourhood and not without reason.