'Big cat' spotted in Cefn Mawr same day as Chirk and Oswestry sightings

Witnesses reported seeing a “massive cat like a panther” near Tŷ Mawr Country Park, prowling the short section of the River Dee between the Cefn Mawr viaduct and the Pontcysyllte Aqueduct.

It is the third sighting of a mystery creature in the area in a 24 hour period this month.

In a report to Puma Watch North Wales, a group set up to investigate such encounters, Craig Davies and Nicole Wynne said they were sitting on the banks of the river at around 6.15pm on Friday, April 16.

It was then that Craig took a photograph showing a creature that Nicole described as “jet black and built differently to any kind of dog”.

Craig, a labourer from Cefn, said that he doesn't know what he caught on camera, but other photographs taken around the same time show that the subject was only there briefly before moving away.

Photograph of mystery creature in Cefn. Image: Craig Davies

He said: "I took the picture on the Friday night and it was Monday morning that I decided I'd have a look through the photos. I saw this black dot. When I zoomed in it looked like that - I still don't know what it is. It looks like a greyhound's back end, but the tail and front end of it look like something else. It looks like a puma or a panther, something along those lines, but I don't know. We took a lot of pictures along the river and its not on any of the others."

Photograph of mystery creature in Cefn. Image: Craig Davies

Nicole told Puma Watch: “We were sitting down the river and while there we didn’t notice anyone go past. It was very quiet and no one was around.

“We took some pictures and last night looked back through them and noticed this thing that looks like some sort of animal, it’s jet black and it seems to be built differently to any kind of dog, no cows can get to that part of the river either.

“It’s not a tree or anything like that as on the other pictures we took it’s not there. We didn’t notice anything at the time. We were about 100 yards away from it.

“A friend that lives nearby has also seen something down there which she described as a massive cat like a panther.”

The area has become a hotbed of big cat sightings.

Puma Watched placed warning stickers on dog poo bins next to the aqueduct six months ago.

Just two hours after the photo was taken, an animal, also described as being like a puma, was seen jumping over a fence in Chirk McDonald’s car park.

That witness, called Georgina, said: “An extremely large cat, the size of a dog, jumped over a fence at the back of McDonald’s car park into the wooded area.”

“I’m sure my partner and I can't be the only ones who saw this.”

The next day, an animal matching the same description was spotted a few miles along the A5 near Oswestry.

Tony Jones, founder of Puma Watch North Wales, said: "The location is near one the end of the Dee Valley, where big cat sightings are not uncommon. Upstream towards Llangollen, we’ve shared reports of a big cat spotted from a canal boat, at Valle Crucis Abbey and on the Horseshoe Pass towards Llandegla."

He added: "When Georgia told us about the big cat jumping over the fence at Chirk McDonald's and said she was sure they couldn't be the only ones who saw it, I didn't expect we'd get two more reports matching the description!

"All three occurred within a 20-hour window and as solitary animals with a hunting range of dozens of miles, it could have been the same cat roaming towards Oswestry from the Dee Valley."

It is not the first time a big cat has been spotted in the area.

In June, 2018, police urged members of the public not to approach a big cat reportedly seen crossing the A5 between Chirk and Llangollen.

The North Wales Police Rural Crime Team tweeted that the "larger than usual cat was seen crossing the road in the early hours of this morning (Friday, June 29)".