As I prepare for another talk, I’ve taken a look at the data that’s come in to bigcatsofsuffolk.com since my last talk, which was in July 2024. (For more on trends in sightings for most of 2023 and 2024, see here.)
The pie chart above shows the total number of all credible big cat sightings in Suffolk that I’ve heard about up to February 2025. I’ve included any sightings that are just over the other side of the Suffolk border and less than two miles within Norfolk, Essex or Cambridgeshire.
That’s a total of 228 reported sightings going all the way back to the earliest credible report of a big cat in Suffolk, from way back in 1976 or 1977.
There are 35 new reports that came in during the last six months. I’ve excluded a few reports that were very vague or in which the witness was very unsure of whether they’d seen a big cat or not.
An analysis of big cat sightings reported to bigcatsofsuffolk.com between July 2024 and February 2025 shows that there are more reports than previously of sightings of melanistic (black) leopards, with fewer pumas (just one reported in this period) and fewer lynxes too. There was an increase in pumas and lynxes reported in the twelve months from July 2023-July 2024, but this trend seems to have tailed off again.
In most “county samples” from different regions of the UK, there’s a trend towards about three quarters of the sample being black leopards, less than a quarter pumas, and a small percentage of lynxes. These proportions are about the same in my sample from Suffolk, except that about a quarter of the sample is “indeterminate” big cats, where the witnesses were unable to say what type of big cat they had seen, or where a newspaper report or police FOIA disclsoure just mentioned a sighting of a big cat without giving further details.
This current trend towards a proportion of about three quarters of the same being black leopards, less than a quarter pumas, and a small percentage of lynxes is more in line with “county samples” from around the UK.
Out of the 35 encounters with big cats that were reported in the past six months, 15 of these encounters had taken place very recently – within a a few days or in some cases of a few hours of the sighting. Of these, 12 big cats were described by the witness as being like a black leopard, with just one puma and one lynx reported, and with just one “indeterminate” big cat of an unknown big cat reported.
There was an increase in what I call “historical sightings”, recent reports of sightings that happened years ago, some from the early 2010s or even the noughties. I was able to match one recent report of a historical sighting, in Coddenham back in 2010, with a sighting that showed up in a Suffolk Police Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) disclosure. There were 20 such “historical” sightings reported in Suffolk in the last six months.
There was a slight increase in reports of indeterminate big cats – where the witness didn’t say what type of big cat they’d seen. This is particularly true for recently received “historical” sightings. Some of these indeterminate cats sound from their brief description like an absolutely enormous feral domestic cat – I’m hearing more reports of these, particularly from around the Woodbridge-Martlesham area. There were nine such “historical” sightings featuring “indeterminate” big cats in this period, nine melanistic leopards seen a while ago and two lynxes seen in recent years.
Recent geographical clusters of big cat sightings have been around Bury St Edmunds in October 2024 and around the Wickham Market area up to January 2025. At the request of witnesses I am being vague about these locations. Both clusters involve reports of melanistic leopards. The trend in reports from the Bury cluster was in reports of smaller than usual black leoapards, including a possible melanistic leopard cub.
Another recent trend is that there are more reports of sounds or vocalisations thought to be made by big cats. But I’m cautious about these, as expert analysis of of two such recordings sent to me turned out to be from a fox and a red deer. I’ve excluded these two from the sample.
For most of the past five decades, a significant majority of big cat witnesses in Suffolk have been male. This was partly to connected to traditionally male occupations that saw men out and about and travelling (usually driving) around dusk and dawn, when bug cats are most active. Since I launched the website in late 2023, though, there has been a noticeable increase in female big cat witnesses. With the last 18 months, a significant majority of witnesses are female. A greater diversity of witnesses would tend to increase the credibility of the reports.