A mythical big cat known as 'The Beast of Bont' is alive and stalking the British hills - feeding off sheep, locals claim. Farmers say numerous flocks are being regularly killed by a ''bloody big' feline - and have even called in the police.
Rumours of a large feline lurking in the Ceredigion area of Wales emerged as far back as the 1970s when a series of sheep were found eaten. There have been numerous cases since including the killing of 12 sheep in 1981 in the village of Bont - giving the beast its name - and the slaughter of 20 in 2012.
Local farmer Suzanne Kay last weekend spotted a mystery beast near her home in Penuwch - which she says may have been a puma or another big cat.
Suzanne said: “I was washing up and looking out of my kitchen window, and I thought to myself, ‘that’s a bloody big cat’,
“It played on my mind, and I thought about it and looked at the perspective, and I realised I shouldn’t have been able to see a cat all that distance away with such clarity.
“It was unmistakably feline, jet black and it had a long black tail carried out the back. It was about the height of a Labrador - but much longer.
“I posted about it on Facebook with a picture of a panther from Google, and I didn’t expect the response I got – I expected to be ridiculed.
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“I didn’t expect the depth of belief, the examples, the stories, the recollections of dates and places and people and names.
“We could be talking about a new indigenous species. The wild cats of Wales.”
Ceredigion farmer Jonathan Davies also recently discovered that several of his sheep had been 'skinned' by an unknown animal. Jonathan contacted Dyfed-Powys Police in February after several of his sheep were brutally killed at his farm in Ponterwyd.
He claims that a police officer told him that it was probably a 'big cat' that winters in Carmarthenshire's Brechfa Forest, before migrating to Myherin Forest in the mountains for the summer.
The officer allegedly blamed the issue on 'discarded pets' abandoned by owners during the 1970s before the Dangerous Wild Animals Act was passed in 1976.
Jonathan said: "I phoned a few farmers and a friend in Devil’s Bridge, and she said she’d been having trouble for about 15 years. She said she loses about six sheep a year.
“She had inspectors at her farm, looking at these carcasses, and they told her it was a cat.
“She told me to call the police and report it, so when I called up, I said to the policewoman, ‘you’re going to think I’ve lost the plot here’.
“But she said I can see it all on the log that there are loads of reports and it’s always happening.
“She told me a woman in Carmarthen had lost eight (sheep) in the space of a week - and she had put remote cameras up to try and catch a glimpse of it.
“I’d heard the stories all my life and I thought people were bloody crazy, or they’d seen a large housecat running across the field and had come up with a ridiculous story. But after my sheep were killed, I believe them.”
Local organization 'Puma Watch' claims to have had 50 sightings since March 2020. The UK Ministry of Agriculture in the 1980s concluded that whatever killed the sheep 'must have been a great deal more powerful than a fox or a dog’.
Despite the claims, Dyfed-Powys Police deny the existence of any 'big cat sighting' log - though have previously issued some guidance and are appealing for the public to photograph it and report sightings.
A spokesperson for the force said: “We wouldn’t be able to confirm any suspected big cat sightings at this time.
“We don’t have anyone specifically trained in shooting big cats, however, our firearms officers are trained in animal destruction for animals that are suffering or dangerously out of control.
“Where sightings of suspected big cats are received these are then reported by the police to the Welsh Government.”
A Welsh Government spokesperson said: “There is no requirement to inform the Welsh Government, however, any report received from the public of alleged sightings of, and alleged attacks by, big cats on livestock in Wales are investigated.
"Any threat to human life is the responsibility of the Home Office and such concerns should be referred to the police.
"All reported sightings and incidents are taken seriously and investigated thoroughly but no hard evidence has been discovered proving the existence of big cats in the Welsh countryside.
"Most attacks on livestock are carried out by native predators such as foxes, or by dogs.”
