No myth-taking what he saw - it was a big cat!

Weeks after the government declared the Blue Mountains big cat file closed, a Sydney father has spoken of a terrifying encounter with a panther-like creature outside his Riverstone, NSW home.

Peter Russell told NSW Police he feared for his life after being stalked by a large, ''completely foreign'' feline predator at Riverstone, on the fringes of dense national park bushland.

It has been sighted at least 12 times in the Riverstone area in recent years.

On December 5, Mr Russell went to investigate why his neighbour's dogs were acting ''so distressed''.
He said, as he looked along the path that led up the street, a very large, broad, cat-like creature ran straight for him.

''This was definitely no dog,'' he said. ''It had a low rumbling growl. It was between knee and hip height, extremely stocky and very fast. I spun on my heel and ran back towards the house. I didn't know that I was going to make it to the door.

''My mind was completely thrown by what I had just witnessed. I thought I was a goner.''

Mr Russell made it safely inside and called Riverstone police.

''The officer laughed and I acknowledged her reaction was understandable,'' he said. ''But I also explained that if some poor kid ends up being taken, and I hadn't called, I would be left devastated.''

Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/environment/animals/blue-mountains-panther-spotted-again-20131214-2ze1p.html#ixzz2nUgwK3zd

NSW big cat report says 'matter closed'

A doctor, dentist, solicitor, clergyman and Qantas pilot have all seen it, as have numerous Rural Fire Service volunteers and an officer from the Department of Agriculture. A NSW detective spoke of how he watched the beast, from barely 50 metres away, for more than a minute. And like most others, he is "convinced" it was a black panther.

Rumours have circulated for decades about a colony of "Big cats" roaming Sydney's western fringes and beyond. But today, a report commissioned by the State Government has concluded that the many hundreds who have seen the panther are wrong.


Ms Coffey said of the report: "We continue to be treated like fringe-dwelling idiots. This is an insult to everyone who has seen the creature."

Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/the-matter-is-closed-new-report-into-blue-mountains-big-cat-20131018-2vs6v.html#ixzz2i6oJqaeG

Interestingly, like many state government 'big cat' reports before it, the book Australian Big Cats: An Unnatural History of Panthers was used as a resource!

On the trail of the Black Panther

He’s devoted more than a decade to investigating sightings of the elusive Blue Mountains panther.

Hazelbrook’s Mike Williams and partner Rebecca Lang were pleased to hear that the black cat is back in the news with the state government investigating sightings of the panther.

The Department of Primary Industries is holding an independent inquiry into reports of large free-ranging cats following discussions with Hawkesbury MP Ray Williams (no relation), the parliamentary secretary for Western Sydney. A DPI spokesman said the report would look at past evidence to “assess the likelihood of the presence of large free-ranging cats”.

It’s due at the end of the year and Williams and Lang’s 450 page book Australian Big Cats: An Unnatural History of Panthers is in the mix as a resource for the inquiry.

So do  big cats really roam the bush? Mr Williams and Ms Lang believe something is definitely out there, probably an animal escaped years ago from a private zoo in the Penrith area.

“I think of all the mythological supposed animals, cats can be proven to exist, it’s much more plausible that a large black cat exists or that a smaller cat could be misidentified,” Mr Williams said.

“They’re there, it’s a mystery, but I don’t know what they are.”

The duo will hold their own 3km Blue Mountains Panther Bushwalk — In Search of Big Cats around Knapsack Creek in Glenbrook during the coming Festival of Walking. Walkers will hear about “compelling” local sightings, see casts taken of suspected big cat prints and see photos of the suspected monster moggies.

“We will probably get someone at the end who complains about not seeing a black cat, but it’s a bit of fun and they will learn about local folklore,” Mr Williams, 53, said.

Participants have been asked to wear sturdy shoes and bring water, a hat and “an open mind”. The event is on October 5 from 10.30am and, for insurance reasons, registration through the festival’s website is required before attending.

Blue Mountains Panther Walk

Save the date!

On October 5, Australian Big Cats: An Unnatural History of Panthers authors Rebecca and Mike are hosting a Blue Mountains Panther Walk during the annual Festival of Walking in the Blue Mountains of NSW.

It’s one of Australia’s greatest wildlife mysteries – do ‘big cats’ really roam the bush? Sightings of black panthers have been made all over Australia, many of which have taken place in the Blue Mountains.

Join the authors of Australian Big Cats: An Unnatural History of Panthers and hear about some compelling local sightings, see casts taken of suspected ‘big cat’ prints, look at some of the best photos taken of monster moggies, and find out what might be behind these stories.

Are you brave enough to join the hunt?

Come join us for a walk and a talk.

Register here: http://festivalofwalking.com/events/blue-mountains-panther-bushwalk-in-search-of-big-cats/

Seen a big cat? Tell us about it!

Yowie sighted at Bexhill in northern NSW

A Yowie has been sighted on Bangalow Road, just north of Bexhill by a Lismore resident.

The witness said the creature moved across the two lanes of bitumen, raising his arm to apparently shield its eyes from the bright high beam glare of the approaching car.

"I would have seen it for between 20 and 30 seconds," the witness recalled. "It was really moving at the time. It leapt the fence no problem. All I can remember was seeing this large black object with a solid build, lanky legs and long lanky arms.

"It wasn't clothed ... it wasn't wearing clothes like a human."

The witness said the creature ran with a fast, stooped pace. It had high shoulders and almost no neck and a small head.

"It was like its head was shrunken into its shoulders."

Sydney-based yowie researcher, Paul Cropper, said the recent sighting revealed some "classic" elements which provided a common thread linking many experiences by many people over many decades.

"The fact that this thing was heavy set, with long arms and a small head ... these are classic traits," Mr Cropper said.

The area where the yowie was seen has a long history of similar sightings with stories running in the local paper, The Northern Star, since the 1800s.

Felled NSW forest confuses koalas

This sad little chap was rescued recently near Bathurst, NSW, and the picture posted on the WIRES Facebook page courtesy of Louise O'Brien.

The koala was found sitting on a pile of wood chips surrounded by a felled pine forest - an odd location for a marsupial that enjoys living in and feasting on eucalypts.

A concerned worker at the site called WIRES and the koala was able to be rescued and is now in care. Another three confused and displaced koalas have been sighted in the same area. If you're out driving in the area along the Mitchell Highway take care - roads (and loggers) are not the friend of koalas, which are incredibly vulnerable to traffic.

Is this the sound of a Yowie walking?

In 2010 a mystery animal researcher ventured into a bush location in the Blue Mountains, west of Sydney. For several minutes he recorded the sound of something walking nearby and throwing what were possibly rocks towards him.

Another researcher, 'Bluegem', who has a background in sound engineering, managed to dampen the man's voice and footsteps so that the other sounds could be more clearly heard.

Thank you to both gentlemen for sharing this audio with us. What do you think, readers?

Have a listen here:

Nimbin 'panther' sighting in northern NSW

 

Video footage of two separate sightings of a large feline at a property within 50km from Lismore will be sent to the Taronga Western Plains Zoo in Dubbo. Experts at the division of Taronga Zoo should be able to determine the nature of the animals on the recordings, according to the Northern Star newspaper.

Shaun Britz of Nimbin confirmed he received the video from a friend of his who preferred to remain anonymous. The recordings were done at the same property by the landowner with a video recorder. 

The recording showed two different sightings, the second one "recorded three months after the first one, at the same property," Mr Britz. Both pieces of footage showed the animal moving around a property, at a distance of over 100m from the camera.

The videos were recorded months before Shaun Britz's sighting last week. He said he received the video last week after he saw a big feline while driving along Shipway Rd, near Nimbin Rocks.

"It is definitely the same type of animal that I saw. It is the same jet back colour," he said. He said that the big cat in the video, which he suspects could be a type of panther, runs as fast as the animal he saw nearby Nimbin.

Shaun Britz said there was anecdotal information on the Internet of similar sightings from Western Australia to Queensland. He added it would be good to have scientific information confirming their existence and where are they located, but they should not be exterminated.

"There has been no attack to humans, I see no reason why we should hunt them down. They seem to feed on wild animals and the odd livestock," he said.

Watch the footage here: Nimbin 'panther' sighting | Northern Star

Yowie looked like 'big black person'

"The trees...sounded like they were exploding, rather than being knocked over..." according to this witness, whose Blue Mountains yowie encounter left him shocked and shaken.

Yowie-haunted farm yields weird prints on car!

Holy hairy hominid Batman!

This Yowie-plagued property yielded a few surprises for our cameraman - strange (marsupial?) prints all over the window of the occupant's car.

What? Where? How? Why?

The Hunter's Boolaroo Beast re-examined

The Newcastle Herald blog team revisited the Boolaroo Beast (as we've just decided to christen it) this week online, in a mildly tongue-in-cheek fashion. But we can tell they're secretly impressed.

The photograph below was taken by keen photographer Shane Foreman, and appeared in the book Australian Big Cats: An Unnatural History of Panthers.

Shane Foreman's panther picture, taken in 2007.

Here's their take:

The Lake Panther. Let’s find this baby and get it to a vet, or at least put a bell on it.

That’s our mission, and there’s good news.

Topics’ Panther surveillance unit – Panther Under Regional Review, or PURR – has had a boost. We’ve got an actual panther witness on board.

Shane Foreman snapped this image near Boolaroo in 2007.

We’re a bit stunned. The shimmering coat, the spring-loaded shoulders; they’re way more pantherish than we expected.

What’s more, he insists they’re not Photoshopped.

‘‘I don’t have Photoshop, and believe Photoshop is for people who can’t take photos,’’ he tells us.

Mr Foreman believes he’s seen big cats twice in Hunter woodlands.

The first sighting in February 2007 yielded this photo by the rail line.

A second was near Muswellbrook in October 2009 on a 7000-hectare property owned by a mate. He’s quick to add that while he was hunting at the time he wasn’t drinking.

‘‘Alcohol and guns don’t mix,’’ Mr Foreman says. And so do we.

Sober people also take better photos, so keep that in mind next time you’re snapping the Lake Panther.

Yowie? We don't think so...

Previous analysis by the CFZ's Mike Williams has shown that this image is in fact of a possum on top of a rock! Note the thermal signature of the 'yowie' is the same as the surrounding trees and the rock - mystery solved!

In the wake of a visiting US television show, which claims to have recorded evidence of a yowie bellowing in remote bushland, Australia seems to be in the grip of 'yowiemania' - or at least our media outlets do.

Secret state government files have revealed a yowie man was recently sighted in the Blue Mountains, according to the Daily Telegraph.

The case emerged among almost 60 suspected panther, leopard and big cat sightings from the past decade sitting in the bowels of the government archives and obtained under freedom of information laws.

But just for the record, these reports haven't been sitting in the bowels of anywhere for a decade - they were liberated at least eight years ago and have since been published in Australian Big Cats: An Unnatural History of Panthers, a massive tome that dedicates more than 430 pages to exploring the phenomenon.

After an overseas TV crew last week claimed it had recorded audio of a yowie man in a remote region on the NSW-Queensland border, documents show the Australian version of Bigfoot was also allegedly sighted last year far closer to metropolitan areas at Springwood, west of Sydney.

In an email to National Parks and Wildlife Service rangers, the witness said he had filmed the creature in March last year and taken photos of footprints. He even drew the yowie man's head, pecs, arms and feet on the picture to make it clearer.

"I have had a seven-year history with this creature," the witness wrote.Canberra crypto-naturalist Tim The Yowie Man, who claims to have seen a yowie in the Brindabella Ranges in 1994, said he was interested in the latest sighting.

"The Blue Mountains has been a common spot for big cats, obviously, but it is not unusual for yowies either," he said. "I have no doubt people believe they are seeing something unusual but many can be cases of mistaken identity."

The NSW Environment Department declined to comment last week. Three years after a government study found there was no evidence of the Blue Mountains Panther - aka the Hawkesbury Big Cat and the Penrith Panther - rangers are still receiving sightings of the creatures.

In an unsolved attack last summer, a Bilpin family's pet alpaca was mauled to death by a suspected big cat that later gutted a kangaroo.

"'Big cat' kill report," Hawkesbury area ranger David Monahan wrote in an email to his boss a few days after the attack.

"Victim was a large alpaca, head crushed, 7cm puncture wounds in skull, adult animal, hairs left on wire fence to be brought in today."

In June 2010, a witness claimed to have seen a cat the size of a german shepherd with yellow eyes beside a "roo on side of the road with head missing", a report said.

On July 13 last year, a man wrote to another ranger after spotting "the panther" on a trip home from Singleton a few days earlier.

There are 400-odd claimed big cat cases in recent decades.

And the rest!

Yowie encounters on the NSW South Coast

We've pulled up some more video from the archives about one of our favourite topics - the yowie!

Two glowing red eyes, an ominous growl, flying stones, tortured screams...what could it have been?

Listen to Mike's interview with this NSW witness...

The Lake George Yowie

Over the years we've amassed quite a bit of interesting footage - mostly witness interviews but occasionally wildlife footage as well. We've also been given footage to share, and this latest offering from authors Tony Healy and Paul Cropper is a pearler - an interview with a man who saw the Lake George Yowie in the mid-1970s!

Lake George (also known by its indigenous name Weereewa - 'bad water') is an aquatic conundrum, a 25km long shallow, salty body of water that lies between Sydney and the nation's capital, Canberra. Its ebb and flow - the Lake will dry up completely for years at a time - has been the source of much local superstition and legend. Several fishermen and five Duntroon military academy cadets have drowned in its waters, and all manner of things have been found when the waters have receded - including a plane!

All kinds of phenomena has visited its unpredictable shore - ghosts, UFOs, and as you'll hear now, even Australia's own bigfoot, the yowie!

Croc cuts lawnmower's grass

Zookeeper Billy Collett was one of two men attacked by a five-metre croc named Elvis at a reptile park north of Sydney after they went into its enclosure about 8am today.

The men - who used their lawnmowers as a barrier when the hulking beast lunged - escaped unharmed, before later executing a daring rescue mission to retrieve the mower.

"It happened that fast, it was that scary. I'm just glad to be alive," Mr Collett told reporters in Gosford.

"We'd just started mowing, the croc's sitting about five foot away from me in the water, then next second he's attached to the end of the mower, dragging it in, and almost taking me into the drink with him.

"My heart almost jumped out of my chest."

Tim Faulkner, who was also inside the enclosure at the time of the attack, said his co-worker was lucky to be alive.

"I had to scream at Billy to let the mower go, because he was thinking about the mower preservation more than his own self-preservation," Mr Faulkner told reporters.

"The croc obviously had a hold of it and both of them would have gone in the water.

"When a croc's got something like that you let him have it ... it's 500 kilos of muscle."

Elvis - who lost two teeth in the encounter with the mower - was acquired by the park in 2008 after causing grief in Darwin harbour by climbing onto fishing boats.

Some of the croc's teeth measure up to 9cm in length.

Mystery surrounds discovery of 25 dead ponies

The discovery of 25 dead ponies in remote bushland has stumped police and veterinarians and horrified locals.

The gruesome discovery, just off the New England Highway near Glen Innes, in the state's north-west, was made after police received a tip-off at the weekend. Twenty-two of the bodies were grouped together while a smaller group of three lay a few metres away at the bottom of a cliff.

The carcasses were too decayed for any kind of toxicology testing, and there were no obvious wounds or injuries that might account for how the animals died.

The animals also bore no brands or other identifying marks that might help trace ownership.

"I've never seen anything of this magnitude. It was a disturbing scene," Inspector Rod Shoesmith, of Armidale police station, said.

Officers photographed the animals then buried their remains at the site. They believe a small- to medium-sized truck was used to dump the ponies.

Anyone who noticed suspicious or unusual behaviour in the area is urged to contact Glen Innes Police or Crime Stoppers on 1800 333 000.

Big cat or little cat? Debate rages on in NT

In NSW a government dept came up with this ID chart to help witnesses gauge the right
size and shape of their mystery animal.

Rumours are rife in the wake of several sightings of a lion in the Northern Territory!

One of the theories doing the rounds is that the lion is real and was being kept illegally by a Territorian obsessed with big cats. The man, so the story goes, has been trying to buy a lion for a few years.

He even had talks with the NT Parks and Wildlife on what was required to keep a potentially man-eating animal in captivity in the Territory. The man also allegedly made inquiries about buying a lion in New South Wales and Western Australia.

The NT News reports his home in NSW was raided by State National Parks officers after a tip-off that he was keeping endangered animals. The inspectors found a lonesome Tasmanian devil.

An impeccably informed source told the NT News: "Apparently, the word was that he had a Tasmanian tiger. Well, that would have been interesting - they went extinct in the 1930s."

A major theme park believes the man may have obtained a big cat from WA, and kept it in a paddock at Humpty Doo. The impeccably informed source said: "A lion's roar can be heard kilometres away."

Curiouser and curiouser!

Author Tony Healy to speak at Braidwood's Cheese Factory

Authors Paul Cropper and Tony Healy.

In the early colonial era Aborigines often warned British settlers to beware of large, ape-like creatures that lurked in the forested mountains. They knew the creatures by many names, including jurrawarra, puttikan and doolagarl.

Soon the colonists, too, began to experience hair-raising encounters with the hulking, foul-smelling creatures, which they referred to as “Australian apes” or “yahoos”. Today they are generally referred to as yowies.

Tony began researching the yowie mystery in 1975. Since then he has interviewed more than a hundred eyewitnesses and searched for the damnably elusive creatures in every Australian state and territory. He has also ventured overseas in search of other semi-legendary ape-men such as the yeti, the orang mawas and the sasquatch.

In his talk Tony will outline the yowie saga from the pre-colonial era to the present day, concentrating particularly on stories from the Braidwood area, and will discuss some of the theories that have been put forward to explain – or explain away – Australia’s most baffling zoological mystery.

A few copies of The Yowie, In Search of Australia’s Bigfoot (Anomalist Books, 2006), which he co-authored with Paul Cropper, and which contains 300 carefully documented eyewitness reports plus a lot of Aboriginal yowie lore, will be available for purchase.

The Old Cheese Factory

~ Long Table Lunch with the Yowies ~

A presentation on the Yowie followed by a long table lunch at $33 a head. 

Bookings essential!

Sunday November 6th 2011, from 11am.

http://www.braidwoodmade.com.au/contact.html

Reidsdale Rural Enterprises

The Old Cheese Factory

92 Sawyers Ridge Road 

Reidsdale

NSW 2622

Tel: 02 4846 1999

Trap is set for Hawkesbury's big cat

THERE are panther sightings all the time, but people are too scared of ridicule to tell people about it, a Grose Vale resident told the Hawkesbury Gazette this week.

Chris Coffey has been tracking black panther sightings in the district for 13 years, and is frustrated by people’s reluctance to divulge their experiences when they have seen big black cats.

“I was in the post office the other day and there was a man there who knew of three people who’d seen one (a big black cat) and there was a girl who happened to be in the post office at the same time who said her dad had seen one,” Ms Coffey said.

Collecting evidence of panthers in the Hawkesbury over many years, Ms Coffey has had a panther trap built.

She said they had a big cat in there one night but the trap was too small and it managed to back its way out – with the roadkill wallaby used as bait.

“We extended it so now it’s much larger,” she said. “We also have three heat-activated cameras.”

She is asking any resident who has seen a big black cat to contact Hawkesbury City Council, which keeps a register of sightings, or the Gazette, or her.

She also asked that if anyone has seen a panther on their property and would be happy for the trap and cameras to be put on their land, she may finally be able to prove that there are panthers in the Hawkesbury.

She said sightings were not just at dusk and dawn – people were seeing them at all times of the day and she wanted people to realise what danger their children could be in near the bush.

***Coincidentally, Chris Coffey wrote the foreword for Australian Big Cats: An Unnatural History of Panthers!

Brush-tailed rock wallaby sanctuary saving species

While the Tasmanian tiger is gone forever everyone can do their bit to help out other threatened species. Waterfall Springs Wildlife Sanctuary and Foundation has been working hard to help out the endangered brush-tailed rock wallaby.

The Waterfall Springs breeding program is about building a healthy captive population of animals for release back into safe wild habitats.

It is a major part of the Australian Government’s national brush-tailed rock-wallaby recovery plan to ensure the long-term survival of the species, listed as the sixth most threatened macropod in Australia.

The sanctuary successfully released captive wallabies into the wild in April and plans another release later this month.

There have also been 12 new animal enclosures and an education facility built at the sanctuary.

One way the public can help threatened species is to join its new volunteer group the Friends Of Waterfall Springs.

The group’s program aims is to provide volunteer support to the sanctuary so it can continue to support brush-tailed rock-wallaby conservation through the endangered species captive breeding program.

Inquiries: 4376 1066.