HAVE you spotted any big cats on your walks around Helensburgh recently?
One Advertiser reader thinks he has – and he wants to know if others have made a similarly curious sighting.
The reader, who asked us not to reveal his name, says he and his wife spotted "a puma-like cat" walking across Helensburgh Golf Club's course at the weekend.
The animal was spotted at around 3pm on Saturday, May 9, according to our eagle-eyed observer, who said: "Myself and my wife were walking on the rough by the 18th tee, when my wife pointed out a large animal which at first I dismissed as a large dog.
"I then began to realise this was what I can only describe as a very large cat, black in colour, about three to four feet in length, definitely not a domestic cat or Scottish wildcat.
"It was crossing the fairway and went into the woods at the Churchill estate end of the course and was about 20 metres away from us."
Sadly our reader wasn't able to capture any footage of the mysterious animal, but he is keen to know whether anybody else has seen something similar in or around the town over the past few days and weeks which might back up his initial conclusions – or, indeed, which might confirm that it isn't a big cat after all.
It wouldn't be the first time a big cat sighting has been reported in and around Helensburgh and Lomond – though it would be the first possible sighting for some years.
Back in the summer of 2004 there was a spate of reports of a large, tan-coloured animal, thought to be a cougar or a puma, at Portincaple, Whistlefield and on the access road past the Coulport armaments depot.
There were also reports of a large black panther-like creature roaming the hills near the Garelochhead military training camp.
READ MORE: From Our Archives: Coulport cougar was on the loose in June 2004
And then, in July 2009, MoD Police dog handler Chris Swallow reported seeing a large black cat close to the West Highland railway line, near his home in Helensburgh.
That sighting made national media headlines – though video footage taken close to the railway line a few days later suggested that the animal Chris had seen was indeed a domestic cat.
Reports of big cat sightings crop up regularly around Britain, with Cumbria and Oxfordshire among the most common locations for reported sightings.
In Scotland the last report of a significant sighting was near the Ayrshire town of Drongan in October 2018 – though after carrying out initial investigations, the Scottish SPCA said they believed that creature, too, was a domestic cat, rather than a black panther as first suspected.
It was also reported at the time that a teenager living in the area had made a hoax cat out of metal, using a laser cutter, and placed it in the field following the initial reports.
READ MORE: Helensburgh moggy sparks debate in 'big cat' claim (from 2009)
No conclusive evidence of a big cat in the area was ever found.
The last apparent confirmation of big cats living in the wild in Scotland – with the exception of the critically-endangered Scottish wildcat – was in 1980, when farmer Ted Noble trapped a puma near Cannich, south-west of Inverness.
That animal lived for a further five years at a wildlife park in Kingussie – although even then, sceptics questioned whether Mr Noble, who said he had set the trap after losing livestock to an unknown animal for two years, had been the victim, or perpetrator, of an elaborate hoax.
That puma was given the name Felicity; after her death she was stuffed and put on display in Inverness Museum.
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