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5,001 - 15,000
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Recent episodes
BCC EP:139 Suffolk born & bred – the people and the panthers
Apr 28, 2026
1h 03m 03s
BCC EP:138 Predators in charge – Midlands leopards in focus
Mar 31, 2026
1h 15m 01s
BCC EP:137 Puma Central – puma witnesses meet at Wildside
Feb 28, 2026
1h 11m 49s
BCC EP:136 North West safari - Cheshire leopards & the Cumbrian cub grows up…
Feb 5, 2026
1h 33m 06s
BCC EP:135 Gaze of the cats - return visits to Glos & Herefordshire
Jan 11, 2026
1h 08m 02s
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| Date | Episode | Description | Length | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 4/28/26 |  BCC EP:139 Suffolk born & bred – the people and the panthers | We hear from Paul, a retired woodsman from mid Suffolk. He has had three encounters with large cats, including one watching him through the bracken. He describes his own incidents and others he has heard. Paul explains his tree management work across the local countryside and considers how big cats would use woods and features of the landscape. Paul and Rick also discuss actions to get more evidence in Suffolk, including a ‘camera wall’ being set up across a nature ... | 1h 03m 03s | ||||||
| 3/31/26 | BCC EP:138 Predators in charge – Midlands leopards in focus | Ian encountered two black leopards in a midlands wood at dusk, watching them rush through the dry reeds by a dyke. Ian discusses his close observation of the playful large cats, and mentions other snippets on similar big cats he has heard from the area. Our second guest Damian also keeps watch for big cat activity around Northamptonshire. He discusses a hoisted half-eaten roe deer carcass he found 8 foot up a tree. His interest in the topic began after driving around a road-kill black cat, th... | 1h 15m 01s | ||||||
| 2/28/26 | BCC EP:137 Puma Central – puma witnesses meet at Wildside | 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... | 1h 11m 49s | ||||||
| 2/5/26 | BCC EP:136 North West safari - Cheshire leopards & the Cumbrian cub grows up… | 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... | 1h 33m 06s | ||||||
| 1/11/26 | BCC EP:135 Gaze of the cats - return visits to Glos & Herefordshire | 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... | 1h 08m 02s | ||||||
| 12/11/25 | BCC EP:134 The Panthers of Avalon | 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 f... | 1h 17m 33s | ||||||
| 11/11/25 | BCC EP:133 Watching, stalking & hiding - big cats at home in Britain | 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 p... | 1h 37m 57s | ||||||
| 10/19/25 | BCC EP:132 Cats breaking out – tales from Hampshire & across the globe | 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 | 1h 07m 59s | ||||||
| 9/24/25 | BCC EP:131 Surrey hills & heathlands – perennial pumas & panthers | 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... | 1h 14m 30s | ||||||
| 8/31/25 | BCC EP:130 The Lactating Leopard - bonding with a black shadow | 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 episo... | 1h 16m 59s | ||||||
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| 8/9/25 | BCC EP:129 Hidden in Herefordshire - the leaping leopard & the hissing puma | Our first guest Malcolm was an arch sceptic on big cats being wild in Britain. Then one night driving home in 2011 he encountered a big black panther on the lane outside his property in Herefordshire. It rushed off, doing a long leap through a high gap in the hedge. Malcolm then asked around and found that other people in the area had also seen a panther around the same time. Malcolm is coincidentally about 3 miles away from Craig, a podcast guest from episodes 72 and 116. Craig joins us agai... | 1h 15m 52s | ||||||
| 7/16/25 | BCC EP:128 Secrets of the hoax – real & imagined beasts | Secrets of the hoax – real & imagined beasts Our first guest Simon Lea had two close encounters with a large black panther at his farmholding in Oxfordshire. He later created the life-size metal panther that was positioned in Charlbury in a large garden close to the station. The ‘panther’ was spotted by train passengers and sometimes got reported as a real big cat, as previously discussed on ep 93 of the podcast. We hear the full story behind the Charlbury Panther from Simon. Simon has ju... | 1h 15m 59s | ||||||
| 6/21/25 | BCC EP:127 Lurking at the margins – big cats of Mercia & Durham | Our first guest Hugh Williams recounts his close encounter with a big cat on a Worcestershire hillside. He also runs the Mysteries of Mercia website which explores quirks of history and folklore in the midlands and Mercia. As well as discussing his panther incident, Hugh mentions other big cat sightings he’s heard of and even a dogman description he’s received. He also considers the treatment of big cats in folklore, he touches on the black dog phenomenon, and he and Rick consider the b... | 1h 25m 30s | ||||||
| 6/1/25 | BCC EP:126 Kent Cat Fight, Surrey double take | Cat Fight is the new novel from author Kit Conway which centres around big cat encounters in Kent, published in the UK in May and the US in June 2025. We speak to Kit about how Big Cat Conversations helped shape her ideas for the big cat aspects of the plot. The book has already been optioned as a future TV screenplay, and Kit discusses how she weaved big cat sightings into a novel about the developing frictions across a close community in south-east England. It is a rollercoaster of a story ... | 1h 18m 12s | ||||||
| 5/9/25 | BCC EP:125 Scottish borderlands – unspoken leopards & lynx | John explores the wild forests and farmland of his local Scottish borders area. It’s a sparsely populated region where black panthers and lynx are quietly discussed by some of the locals. John takes us through various lynx encounters, including two of his own, and describes his three experiences with large black cats – one seen nearby from a slow moving train, and one unnervingly close at night. John starts the episode by explaining how his military background helps his ob... | 1h 06m 31s | ||||||
| 4/17/25 | BCC EP:124 Confronting a midlands panther - a five metre face-off | John met a “black panther” during his evening dog walks four times in 1996 in Staffordshire. On the first occasion he was confronted directly by the cat at close range. As the predator was poised, there seemed no easy way out. John explains his thoughts and the subliminal messages he received at that moment, as he reached in his pocket and unlatched his Swiss army knife… ‘Big Cat Mystery’ outro track courtesy of Lancashire band DRIVE. Words of the Week: beauty in the beast ... | 1h 06m 30s | ||||||
| 3/26/25 | BCC EP:123 A shot in the dark – green eyes through the snow | Bonus feature - British wolverines? Our first guest Darren was asked to despatch a troublesome fox in south Wales in 1998. In the snowy conditions he actually saw a puma though his gun sights – he re-lives the high emotions on the winter hillside as bright green eyeshine stared back. Rick and Darren also consider the prospects of a big cat being trapped, and they discuss an event in 2011, when the police and the Home Office verified a plaster cast as from a puma-like big cat. For... | 1h 17m 51s | ||||||
| 3/3/25 | BCC EP:122 The puma paradox – Australia’s roo slayers | Andrea is a podcast listener in Victoria, Australia. She didn’t expect to experience big cats on her land. But she explains how events and sightings have indicated she has visiting pumas, which seem to predate kangaroos, wallabies and rabbits. She looks after two pure dingoes, which have reacted to calls and movements of what appear to be a nearby big cat. Andrea discusses life with the dingoes, and her heightened awareness of new hidden predators in the local bushland. In the fin... | 1h 35m 12s | ||||||
| 2/8/25 | BCC EP:121 Cubs – from Cumbria to Devon… | We return to Cumbria for latest news of the mother and cub black leopards, being experienced by Liz on nearby land to her property. In autumn and winter sightings Liz has noticed longer fur develop on the mother, as well as alarm calls from magpies harassing the cats. Liz and Rick discuss the challenges of getting evidence from this ongoing case. UPDATE: Between recording and then releasing this interview with Liz, she reports that her husband has now had two evening encounters wi... | 1h 11m 47s | ||||||
| 1/16/25 | BCC EP:120 British lynx & leopards – more police memoirs | Two retired police officers report their big cat encounters and incidents, including black leopards & lynx. We conclude the episode with comments on the January 2025 lynx release & capture saga from Paul Macdonald of Scottish Big Cat Research. Andrew our first guest from County Durham recounts his encounter with what he believes was a black leopard, when walking his dog in 2003. Through his police activity he then learnt about similar big black cat reports nearby, and his intere... | 1h 28m 14s | ||||||
| 12/12/24 | BCC EP:119 Over the hedge – big cats of Hereford & Worcestershire | Our end-of-year extended episode features Mandy from Worcestershire and Jon from neighbouring Herefordshire. Mandy explains the events which led to her setting-up a big cats Facebook group in Worcestershire, as a hotline for reports and discussion. Her own sighting was a close-up view of a black leopard type of cat, and instantly drew her to the subject. Jon watched a puma slink through his garden one night in 2003, close to the house he was renovating. His initial shock and concern turned to... | 1h 47m 36s | ||||||
| 11/17/24 | BCC EP:118 Mother & cub on the moors – son of the Exmoor Beast | Tommy had two sightings of black panthers in the north of Exmoor as a teenager in the 90s. His first viewing was of a mother guiding a small cub, which made a lasting impression on him. Tommy recounts a local vicar’s sighting of a big black cat at the time, and he explains how local teenagers related to the Exmoor Beast legend. Later in his army career, Tommy heard fellow soldiers admitting to seeing pumas on Ministry of Defence land in Northumberland. Word of the week: &nb... | 59m 56s | ||||||
| 10/25/24 | BCC EP:117 The leopard, the cub & the farmyard strays – in the company of cats | Liz describes several encounters with a black leopard visiting the farmyard where she and her husband feed the farm cats. She has been watched and advanced on by the large cat and is now fully alert to its potential presence. On one occasion Liz noticed a small panther like cat dart out of cover to catch up with the big cat, and realised it was a cub rushing to its mother. Liz reports how the farm cats change behaviour due to the bigger cats’ presence, and she explains how... | 1h 17m 59s | ||||||
| 10/4/24 | BCC EP:116 The clawed carcass - grappling with the evidence? | Craig our guest returns after episode 72 when he re-lived his Exmoor big cat encounters in the 1980s. Now based in Herefordshire, Craig explains the big cat reports and potential activity occurring in his own village, right where he walks his dogs. He has been followed by an animal with large piercing eyeshine which alarmed his dogs, and he has recently found two fresh deer carcasses, one freshly devoured, and the other was still warm, had a severed windpipe, and showed claw marks raked down ... | 1h 00m 47s | ||||||
| 9/12/24 | BCC EP:115 The leopard trail to Skye | Our first guest Graham recounts a close encounter with a large black cat on the Isle of Skye during one of his fishing trips. We discuss how a cat like a black leopard could have arrived on Skye and how well such a cat could go unnoticed in the island’s wild terrain. For our second guest we catch up with Scotland research coordinator Paul Macdonald. Amongst recent highlights he describes two clips of footage shown to him at a recent rural show stand, and a report of a roadside puma car... | 1h 18m 48s | ||||||
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Chart Positions
6 placements across 5 markets.
Chart Positions
6 placements across 5 markets.