A huge black cat, reportedly larger than a Labrador, has been sighted multiple times in Wales over the past few weeks.
The animal, dubbed the ‘Puma of Pontybodkin’, was seen on a road on New Year’s Eve just days after a similar animal was spotted running across a field.
Among the first people to spot the huge beast was walker Toby Matthews, who filmed what he claimed was a big black cat on a lane near the village of Pontybodkin in November.
‘I looked up and had a sudden moment of shock, almost like when you wake up suddenly from a dream feeling like you’re falling,’ he said.
‘Maybe 50 or 60 feet away was an enormous black cat looking right at me.
‘I took a photo then turned around and quickly walked back. I wanted to start running but was worried it’d give chase.
‘I’m convinced that it was a puma, it was about two or three times the size of my little Labrador.
‘It was probably around the same size as some of the jaguars at the zoo, and I think it was completely black.
‘It’s a really deserted and rural area and I rarely pass anyone else on walks, there’s thick woodland either side of the path where animals can probably stay undisturbed for years.’
A Puma Watch North Wales group was created and a number of sightings have been reported since November.
The latest witness described the elusive animal as ‘a large cat roughly the size of a Labrador’ and saw it along the a busy A-road near Talacre in Flintshire – 20 miles away from previous reports.
‘Through the window that overlooks the field I saw a cat shaped, however dog sized, full black figure run across the field towards the hedge/fence,’ the witness said.
‘I lost sight of it as there’s a brow in the hill. It was sprinting across.
‘I could tell it was not a dog, however I did have a look to see if there were any dog walkers, however there weren’t any.
‘This comes after a sighting of a big cat on the old railway line last month, which is 150m to 200m away. Unfortunately, I was unable to take a video or photo.’
The large cat was also reported around 50 miles away in Snowdonia in 2020. One farmer lost 10 sheep to a mystery killer in the area at around the same time.
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