We return to Wildside Exotic Rescue in Herefordshire, where owner Lindsay Mckenna now cares for 11 pumas, a lynx, a serval and many other animals which were exotic captives needing new and better homes.

Our 4 guests describe their own sightings of pumas wild in Britain, and compare them to the pumas at Wildside...

Jenny near Bath watched a puma exploring her garden at 6.30am in 2023 before it loped off into the adjacent wood.

Tracey re-lives her close encounter with a grey-tone puma in Chile, and prompts discussion on pumas avoiding people even when close by.

John Bilney explains how he sets up trail cams at woodland edges in the south Cotswolds, after he confronted two pumas on a cycle to work one morning.

Jon from Carmarthen recounts the hissing puma in front of his car as it cornered a bend in south-west Wales, experienced just 5 days before the podcast recording.

The guests chat with Lindsay about the challenges of caring for pumas at Wildside, as we hear the puma sounds in the background as they feed on portions of locally culled fallow deer. Rick offered the pumas their first taste of boiled eggs…

Website for Wildside Exotic Rescue, where we recorded this episode. Note the cottages for hire, the Open Days, and the Donations pages, as ways of supporting Wildside.

https://www.wildsideexoticrescue.co.uk/

Words of the week: coalition of cats

28 February 2026

Our first guest Darren describes his investigations on local marshes in Cheshire, where he’s seen a black leopard, chased by his dog. This happened after his previous encounters with similar looking cats nearby, including on a disused golf course. Some of Darren’s encounters have been close up, and most have involved dogs around as well. Darren explains how these events have motivated him to search for more evidence and do a Youtube channel.

For our second guest we have an update from Liz in Cumbria, where a mother and cub, presumed black leopards, have been visiting the area. Liz has six more big cat events to describe around her farmhouse from the past year. She discusses what appears to be a young male big black cat loitering around the property. It shows far less predictable behaviour than the mother’s calm vibes.

Words of the week: Panthera pardus Britannica

5 February, 2026

Tracey had a prolonged and close view of a black panther outside her car at a forest edge in Gloucestershire in 2001. Two years later she was able to compare the cat with a black leopardess at Heythrop private zoo in the Cotswolds.

Tracey recounts other big cat reports from family and friends, including from her sister who was a sceptic until seeing a black panther in the same general area, and from friends who were confronted by a puma on a cycleway near Stroud.

Tracey has had two puma encounters herself. The first on a mountain path when trekking in Patagonia, and then in October 2025, when driving on the edge of Cirencester. Rick recalls past big cat sightings in precisely the same area of Cirencester, unknown to Tracey.

In a final segment we play voice messages from Craig in Herefordshire as he follows up ep129 when he reported a puma on one of his trail cams. In December Craig was charged by a puma just meters from that camera and he’s twice seen watching eye shine at close range. We then hear from Mark Graves, from ep 95, as he responds to Craig’s comments and queries about these recent events.

Word of the week: zoophobia

11 January 2026

Our first guest Sam describes his late brother Jake’s sighting of a black panther when he was fishing in south Devon. Then Sam explains his own view of a black leopard watching cattle and their calves on the Somerset levels near Glastonbury. Sam and Rick then discuss their inputs to a recent short film on big cat sightings in Somerset – see the podcast website for a link to the film,

bigcatconversations.com/refs-links/

Our second guest Sonia follows-up the two big cat encounters from Hampshire on episode 132. Sonia had never heard of any black panther reports in the same area and year as her close-up incident. But when she heard Dave’s account on that episode, it appeared to be the same big black cat at around the same time. Sonia mentions that a private travelling menagerie was based in Petersfield from the 1930s. Our link on the website, at the above link, includes a recording about the menagerie from Petersfield Shine Radio.

Thanks to Mark Jones in New South Wales for our closing music.

Word of the Week: vindicated

11 December 2025

Lee our first guest describes his close observation of a puma stalking fallow deer in Buckinghamshire. He watched the circling deer behaviour as they responded as a protective group to the advancing predator, and he describes the fear he felt at finding himself so close to the scene.

John our second guest returns after episode 125, with more big cat stories from the Scottish Borders, including lynx in Kielder Forest and night-time encounters with staring and stalking animals that were potential big cats. John also gives his perspective on living with predators in the area. John has caught up with the podcasts as a recently joined listener, and gives his overview of the trends he spots in all the content. John and Rick also discuss the role of art and music in communicating British big cats, and John has written and performed another outro song for the podcast. This new one is ‘Stumbling Blind’, about a mother and cub – lyrics are displayed on the BCC website under ep 133.

Word of the week: interpretation

11 November 2025

Dave our guest had two big cat encounters in East Hampshire in the 1990s. We also hear some panther and puma incidents reported to him through his fishing and his zookeeper networks.

Dave also mentions rumours of canned hunting in the past as one of the origins of the large cats in Britain, and he describes some experiences overseas involving a captive lioness, a captive tiger, and escaped pumas.

Words of the week: blending into nature

19 October 2025

Our first guest Miriam had a close-up sighting of a puma back in 1968 in Surrey, while on an archaeological dig. She explains how she and her mother watched in silence before in slunk off. The local police followed up and found footprints from which they took casts.

Miriam was recruited as a podcast guest at the recent event, Depicting Britain’s Beasts, when she visited the Nature in Art specialist wildlife gallery. Poems from podcast listeners were published in a document for that event, and the document is now available as a pdf file on the BCC website here… https://bigcatconversations.com/poetry/

Our second guest Gary Ridley is a long-term investigator in the county and runs the Surrey Panther Watch website. He takes us though some recent big incidents, including some credible footage which was scaled to suggest a black leopard size cat.

Gary is keen to achieve more public awareness on the presence of big cats, and he feels that the risks to pet cats and dogs should be faced up to, so people know to take precautions if a big cat is believed to be around.

Word of the week: fecundity

24 September 2025

Charlie our guest recounts 6 months of his life at the age of 9 back in 1973-74. Around his house in Ayrshire his family lived alongside a female big black cat, seen active in fields and woods and at one stage she was lactating.

Charlie regularly encountered the cat during spells when he escaped the ongoing stress at home. He describes its consistent behaviours, including its calls and its hunting. It took rabbits from his snares and he observed it resting in sun traps.

This episode tells a remarkable story of a large black cat, most likely a female leopard, out in the wild before the 1976 Dangerous Wild Animals Act. Charlie considers why the cat tolerated him in particular, as well as his family members.

Since recording the episode, Charlie has recalled one other memorable account of the big cat, which was not described in the conversation with Rick. Charlie explains it here... "One thing I didn't mention was the night it walked on the roof of my largest den it was fully enclosed with a door and a lift-up window and all closed up. It walked across the roof making the acknowledgement snorting snuffle noise. It stayed up there sitting or lying for a while. I then heard the soft pads on the leaves as she jumped down into the wood..."

In terms of the origins of the cat, Charlie adds this… “I think it was likely a released one, possibly when she was pregnant as it wasn't scared of people. Wary yes but not scared. It would happily eat rabbits etc with human scent on, so she was possibly used to eating meat handled by humans?”

Words of the week: gypsy warnings

1 September 2025