French Police Hunt Mystery Black Felid
Posted by: Loren Coleman on August 13th, 2006
August 14, 2006
Boulogne-sur-mer, France • Scores of policemen, some armed with shotguns, are hunting a mysterious big black feline spotted in northern France, officers said.
The operation was launched Wednesday near the town of Boulogne-sur-Mer after several panicked people first raised the alarm on seeing what they described as a “panther” about 1.2 metres long on a popular beach.
Some 80 officers and a helicopter were immediately deployed on a search, and the beach was closed for a day, but they failed to find their quarry.
Belgian tourists and residents then reported seeing the black beast on Friday, and on Saturday people out strolling saw it in the middle of a cornfield.
Police finally spotted it through binoculars.
“It’s a black or dark feline, fairly hefty, not very high but pretty long. It’s not a panther. It’s a big cat with at least a metre in length,” one officer said.
He added that it appeared to disappearing into forested areas, frustrating efforts to catch it or kill it.
The type and origin of the big cat was unknown. A circus in the area denied having lost any animals.
The sightings recalled those of a similar beast seen in the nearby town of Touquet in 1986 which was never found despite the efforts of 50 officers and a helicopter.
Source: AFP, The Peninsula, Qatar, Monday, August 14, 2006.
About Loren Coleman
Loren Coleman is one of the world’s leading cryptozoologists, some say “the” leading living cryptozoologist. Certainly, he is acknowledged as the current living American researcher and writer who has most popularized cryptozoology in the late 20th and early 21st centuries.
Starting his fieldwork and investigations in 1960, after traveling and trekking extensively in pursuit of cryptozoological mysteries, Coleman began writing to share his experiences in 1969. An honorary member of Ivan T. Sanderson’s Society for the Investigation of the Unexplained in the 1970s, Coleman has been bestowed with similar honorary memberships of the North Idaho College Cryptozoology Club in 1983, and in subsequent years, that of the British Columbia Scientific Cryptozoology Club, CryptoSafari International, and other international organizations. He was also a Life Member and Benefactor of the International Society of Cryptozoology (now-defunct).
Loren Coleman’s daily blog, as a member of the Cryptomundo Team, served as an ongoing avenue of communication for the ever-growing body of cryptozoo news from 2005 through 2013. He returned as an infrequent contributor beginning Halloween week of 2015.
Coleman is the founder in 2003, and current director of the International Cryptozoology Museum in Portland, Maine.
Okay, so there is a large, black cat in france that everyone is afraid of? Has there been reports of it killing anything/one? Isn’t it like the europeans to scream and run, then hunt down (literally) anything that doesn’t fit into their world? I can understand public safety, but with the advancements in animal capturing–shotguns? Forgive me, I am a gun enthusiast, a hunter and the such, but really, if you are planning to kill this thing, you would do better with a hunting rifle. Something that doesn’t require you to be within striking range. Not large/tall enough to be a panther. How does he know? I don’t think I could make that judgement call thru binoculars, and I fancy myself a man of nature. Does that circus lose animals on a regular basis, after all it didn’t take long for the officials to look at them. So there is another group of large felines on planet earth, cool!
Why would they want to kill it.
“Why would they want to kill it.”
“Isn’t it like the europeans to scream and run, then hunt down (literally) anything that doesn’t fit into their world? ”
🙂
I’m with Shumway though… why would you hunt a big cat with a shotgun? You’d about be better off with a bow and arrow. Definitely doesn’t sound big enough to be a panther… unless it’s a young one. Could be a Lynx or a Bobcat or some feline in that range. Isn’t there an African feline that is about the size of a Lynx or Bobcat?
Hello from France! It’s funny how this “big black feline” story is becoming world news 😉
It’s the summer holidays here and there’s a tradition in the media to give more attention to “weird” but not very important news. Supposedely, people don’t want to know about serious stuff while they are on holidays. So any story about an unusual animal garners headlines. Hence the “great cat hunt” of August 2006…
In truth, this mystery animal didn’t attack anybody, so the policemen were instructed to try and catch it alive. Nobody knew in the beginning what it was (the first reports being very vague) so a few shotguns were deemed necessary in case it really was a panther or bobcat. But as no zoo or circus had lost an animal in the area, that hypothesis became rapidly less likely.
The animal was photographed 3 days ago and it’s obvious it’s not a panther or lynx, but probably a large domestic cat… and a lot of imagination on the part of the tourists who started the story!
Here’s a link to a photograph (click on the words “Agrandir l’image” to enlarge) :
The picture was taken from about 400 meters (a third of a mile) and it’s difficult to know the scale because there’s only grass apart from the animal.
neither the bobcat nor the lynx, that I’m aware of, have a melanistic phase (but then again, the American Mountain Lion isn’t either, but people keep seeing “black panthers” here too.)