Whilst I have been visiting the Royal Victoria Military Hospital this autumn/winter I have been utilising my knowledge of the ancient Brythonic lunar calendar (the "Beth Luis Nion" go to: https://www.arafel.co.uk/2019/04/britons-hidden-law-permaculture.html & https://www.arafel.co.uk/2019/04/britains-hidden-lore-cont-resolution.html), to inform the timing. I was, therefore, aware that my explorations of the site were contemporaneous with celestial events, I was not, however, aware just how true this was until I discovered that, quote; "(This) week offers multiple opportunities to get a great look at the Red Planet.
On Wednesday (Dec. 7), the full moon will be in close proximity to a bright Mars during an event known as a lunar occultation. And on Thursday (Dec. 8), Mars will be at opposition, meaning that in Earth's skies, it will be found directly opposite the sun. These events also happen to coincide with Mars being close to perigee (its closest point to Earth), which occurred on Nov. 30.
The
perfect storm of astronomical events means that this is a wonderful
week to watch Mars in the night sky, appearing larger and brighter than
usual and making itself easy to spot next to a full Cold Moon.
And even if you have cloudy skies or can't make it outside, you're
still in luck: There are plenty of opportunities to see Mars at its best
this week thanks to several free online livestreams.".."When the Red Planet is in opposition, it is much brighter than usual
and therefore much easier to see in the night sky. This event only
happens every 26 months, and the planet's elliptical orbit means during
some oppositions Mars is closer to Earth than others."
I observed unusual planetary activity in the vicinity of the Moon on the full moon of "Beth" (Birch), though and surmised that the planet involved in the rather spectacular show was (indeed), Mars (discovering the article from space.com the following day). The astrological significance of this is interesting esp. as Mars is considered (by many cultures), to hold influence over man's warlike tendencies and the Moon to foster the more more caring, compassionate and nurturing aspects of our nature. Thus Mars was "occulted" by the Moon and the "opposition" meant it could clearly be seen (even by amateurs like me), both prior to and following the event. I wonder what Venus was doing, quote; "later generations have simply either ignored or misinterpreted the record because the implications of literal interpretation are too disturbing" (go to: https://forum.5filters.info/t/that-graham-hancock-hes-a-bad-un/3621/12 & https://forum.5filters.info/t/for-gkh-and-others-who-may-find-it-interesting-fascinating-proposal/3633/2)?
Viscous Snitch
"He's a glitch (not a witch), he's a viscous, viscous, viscous snitch!
He's an oily bitch where it gives you the itch he's a viscous, viscous, viscous snitch!
Just one twitch and you'll end up in a ditch with a viscous, viscous, viscous snitch!
There's always a hitch and you'll never get rich he's a viscous, viscous, viscous snitch!"
Slippy where he should be sticky and visa versa!
#Superfluous
"This is it
Breaking up or breaking through Breaking something's all we ever do Shoot straight, travel far Stone crazy's all we ever are But I don't care for lies And I won't tell you twice Because when all else fails Dead men tell no tales......."
I visited the former site of the Royal Victoria Military Hospital ("RVMH"), again last Saturday (3rd December), and this time the tower, Chapel Memorial* and the visitor's centre were all open (if you do plan to visit -esp. the chapel-, do check, these times vary throughout the year, go to: https://www.hants.gov.uk/thingstodo/countryparks/rvcp/visit & https://documents.hants.gov.uk/ccbs/countryside/RVCPMap6.pdf), be advised that you will be charged admittance if you wish to ascend the tower to the top and that the spiral staircase within the tower and climbing it to are most vertigo inducing. I will have to steel myself if I wish to take in the view (I had forgotten my vertigo in this regard but in my defence the effect of the open, red steel, spiral-staircase within the bright white painted brickwork of the tower was Hitchcock-ian -I've been a "flat-lander" too long-).
*Nb. The chapel and tower exhibitions are "memorials" the centre is not a museum.
I have to say that the staff were really, really nice it they are obviously used to the heightened emotional state the place tends to induce in people. If you have a family history you wish to relate they are very happy to hear it and also share their own (it seems that there is, indeed, method to the madness as the people I met all had personal and/or familial reasons for wanting to provide the service they do). One had a relative who served in the artillery in N.Africa and Italy (Monte Cassino), Spike Milligan was in the heavy artillery for both campaigns and my good friend A.Laroche had a great uncle who served in Tobruk was invalided to Malta and then sent off (having been "repaired"), to the hell-on-Earth that was Monte Cassino. According to my friend his uncle was deeply affected by his experience and remained, very obviously, traumatised for the rest of his life. I discussed the grim absurdity of the bombing of the monastery with the member of staff concerned and we agreed that it seems that witnessing the desecration and destruction of such an historic and sacred place (certainly to many of the soldiers on both sides of the conflict), was the straw-that-broke-the-camel's-back for significant numbers of those who witnessed it:
I've always thought that it is a desperate shame that there were no recordings made (or at least there are none that survived -and I don't recall Spike ever mentioning recordings being made in any of his books-), of Spike's trumpet playing during his time at the Battle of Cassino (also known as "The Battle for Rome").
It is a beautiful, autumnal, late-afternoon outside a church hall on the side of a mountain in south-central Italy in 1944. An American colonel and a female adjutant (not his), from staff headquarters arrive in a jeep and they are looking for a British officer. Through the open door the pair can see shadows and movement, they also perceive faint and unusual sounds emanating from within. With the sun gleaming off both his cap and the adjutant the colonel steps into the hallway and begins to make out a group of British Officers and NCOs wobbling, shuffling and occasionally jerking about as if electrocuted by a cattle-prod (or even lightning), and they are making strange sounds something like this; "awwooogleugglllleoggle, iwwwigglyyoggwall, hehehigwooblewoblewooble" and so forth. The Yank Colonel looks on incredulously, finally he manages to catch the eye of one of the British officers, who regards him with scant interest. The American asks; "What are you Limey's doing?!" The officer he has addressed slightly straightens himself, as he would if challenged whilst carefully making his way home from the local public house, on an early New Year's morning, by a young police officer and, seeming to vibrate with only slightly less intensity than before, replies; "Voting for f**king Christmas old-man! What does it look like we're doing?!"
Just another one of those tales dead men don't tell you might say and I was to discover just how apposite the notion is when I began to question the staff concerning sources for information on any of those involved with the hospital whilst it was open. The thing one has to remember is that this was a military hospital so whilst patient confidentiality with regard to medical records was assiduously observed, as it still would be in any civilian hospital, patients at the Royal Victoria were also serving soldiers, as were the staff, and there are strict controls on the keeping of any personal records in the services to this day. Patient or staff; diaries, letters, memoirs and photographs are, I was told, many of them actually considered state secrets. The other problem is that where records do exist they are held not just by the three services (army, navy and air force), but also by the various regiments, ships and squadrons (et.al). The medical staff were also drawn from more than one place, some were from the Royal Army Medical Corps ("RAMC" go to: https://www.army.mod.uk/who-we-are/corps-regiments-and-units/army-medical-services/royal-army-medical-corps/), some were from Queen Alexandra's Royal Army Nursing Corps ("QARANC" go to: https://www.army.mod.uk/who-we-are/corps-regiments-and-units/army-medical-services/queen-alexandras-royal-army-nursing-corps/), and some from the Red Cross (go to: https://www.redcross.org.uk/). Again those in either the RAMC or QARANC would be court-martial-ed if they were to divulge any information with regard to their service. This makes researching the experiences of those involved with the RVMH extremely challenging.
An author who has, at least, made the attempt would appear to be Philip Hoare, quote: "Spike Island* (the name its inhabitants gave the
area centuries before), is as singular as Hoare's previous work: simply,
his chosen subject is so interesting it is astonishing to consider that
no one has written of it before. However, few could combine such
rigorous scholarly accuracy with Hoare's narrative flair. His literary
tones - ghostly, haunting, reminiscent of du Maurier - find their echo
in Netley's grim history.
This history is even
greater, more labyrinthine, than the hospital itself, with stories
spawning still more stories, each as fascinating as the one before.
Victims of the Boer War and both world wars found themselves here;
Wilfred Owen was a patient. An 'eerie, depressing place', doctors would
experiment on themselves in the laboratories and, it was rumoured, use
German PoWs as human guinea pigs. In the psychiatric wing, shell-shock
victims were treated as harshly as the decades dictated and Hoare's
descriptions of these psychological casualties are deeply affecting": https://www.theguardian.com/books/2001/apr/22/historybooks.features In an article in the Guardian in the August of 2014 Hoare writes, quote; "The Royal Victoria Military
Hospital at Netley was not only England's biggest building, but also
its "largest palace of pain", according to a 1900 report. Set on the
shores of Southampton Water in Hampshire, it was created in response to
the Crimean war, and designed to serve an empire. It would end up
ministering to apocalypse. During the first world war, this sprawling
brick behemoth – a quarter of a mile long – became a microcosm of what
was happening across the English Channel.
Now,
a century later, a remarkable album of photographs has come to light to
document the men and women who worked at Netley, who were healed there,
or who died there. Published here for the first time, these poignant
and oddly immediate images reveal the extent of this global conflict,
and the way it involved civilians as well as serving men and women.
Their faces tell untold stories. They were far from the action, but they
were the ordinary people who serviced and fed the insensate and
insatiable monster that was the war.
Left
to right: a ward maid at Netley, an orderly with ominous-looking
barrow, and an officer in one of Royal Victoria Hospital's long
terraces. Photographs: courtesy Marion Ivey
When I began to write my book Spike Island: The Memory of a Military Hospital,
I was amazed at how few records remained to document Netley's story.
The hospital stood, from its foundation in 1856 to its demolition in
1966, for more than a century. Yet almost nothing remained in the public
archive to commemorate it. What emerged instead were family memories of
1914-18, years that saw Netley's resources at peak demand.
Thousands
of men and women lived and died in this place, remembered in
sepia-scored letters and postcards, and pictures taken by local
photographers. Only a precious few, such as this album, survive to
reclaim a site that was once world-famous. When Conan Doyle published
his first Sherlock Holmes mystery, A Study in Scarlet, he told his
readers that Dr Watson trained as an army doctor at Netley – its name
was so well known that the author did not need to explain any further**": https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2014/aug/21/royal-victoria-hospital-netley-ww1-first-world-war-photographs-documentary-philip-hoare
*As the day is long I did not know this until I discovered the Guardian article whilst composing this post (and after I had referenced Milligan -"was that 50milligans doctor?"-). Their part in my downfall hey? #Gruaniad
**Italics mine. Yet the hospital has faded from public consciousness along with its story for as Britain continues to posture (although "mutton-dressed-as-lamb"), on the world's stage the true cost of imperial Britannia, needs-must, remains hidden.
Hoare is clearly well aware that there is precious little with which to tell either the hospital's story or, by extension, the wider story of the cost of empire.
This puts any film-maker in an invidious position for no-one (esp. when tackling such a delicate subject), wants to leave themselves open to the accusation of having put their own words into their character's mouths. So how does one characterise the dramatis personae? There is one well known patient, Wilfred Owen, quote; "One wet night during this time he was blown into the air while he
slept. For the next several days he hid in a hole too small for his
body, with the body of a friend, now dead, huddled in a similar hole
opposite him, and less than six feet away. In these letters to his
mother he directed his bitterness not at the enemy but at the people
back in England “who might relieve us and will not.”
Having endured such experiences in January, March, and April, Owen
was sent to a series of hospitals between May 1 and June 26, 1917
because of severe headaches. He thought them related to his brain
concussion, but they were eventually diagnosed as symptoms of shell
shock, and he was sent to Craiglockhart War Hospital in Edinburgh to
become a patient of Dr. A. Brock, the associate of Dr. W.H.R. Rivers,
the noted neurologist and psychologist to whom Siegfried Sassoon was assigned when he arrived six weeks later."..."When Sassoon arrived, it took Owen two weeks to get the courage to knock
on his door and identify himself as a poet. At that time Owen, like
many others in the hospital, was speaking with a stammer. By autumn he
was not only articulate with his new friends and lecturing in the
community but was able to use his terrifying experiences in France, and
his conflicts about returning, as the subject of poems expressing his
own deepest feelings.": https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/wilfred-owen
The exhibit concerns the manufactured and fraudulent presentation of the facts by "War Neurosis"..
It must be remembered that the film was made whilst WW1 was still going on, rather obviously the British state wanted to give the impression that whilst the weapons being employed for causing mass slaughter were innovative and modern so was the standard of treatment of the casualties they caused (as if all could be "cured" -incl. the enemies of empire-).
The Commonwealth War Graves Cemetery (Netley)
"Where did you get that hat?"
A priest of the hospital (God alone knows what he went through)
A soldier of the Hampshire Regiment, quote: "The 2nd Hampshire was originally based in Aldershot, but were mobilised
when war was declared. They left for France as part of the 1st Division
which formed a major part of the British Expeditionary Force."..."Disorder surrounded the withdrawal to Dunkirk, but the Battalion
withdrew in good order. They arrived in Proven at 4pm on 29th May,
having travelled over 45 miles in 2 days, under very difficult
conditions. At Hondschoote they were ordered to destroy all vehicles and
move to Uxem. On 30th May, Uxem was shelled heavily, but the Battalion
held the position, and on 1st June was ordered to withdraw to Dunkirk at
5pm that day. It was a race against time; the enemy worked incessantly
to cut off the Allies last chance of escape. However, the 2nd Hampshire
reached the beach and took their place in the long, orderly queues,
getting home via ships of every kind and arriving at different ports all
along the coast. Nevertheless, the Hampshires arrived home complete
with all their arms and equipment, and had suffered very few casualties.*": https://www.royalhampshireregiment.org/about-the-museum/timeline/dunkirk-1939-1940/
*Italics mine. Few perhaps but not none, Private R.T.Wallis died in the July aged 25, presumably of wounds sustained in France. well at least he came home (just didn't stay very long). I picked his grave to photograph because of the Hampshire insignia, it was not until I reviewed my photos today that I realised that the man buried was in the same battle during which my great uncle William was killed.
Wobblin' Tommies?
Whilst imagining the cast for Wobblin' Tommies one character, a "shot-away" artillery corporal (played by Daniel Radcliffe), came to mind and, as I have begun to research more seriously, a scene with a senior medical officer (the character played by Benedict Cumberbatch), began to develop, it goes something like this (it's a closing scene too so should be full of pathos); Corp; "Do you know what you are sending those guys back to?" Officer does not reply looks at NCO. Corp; "You don't have a clue do you? Not a f**king clue!" (NCO not caring that he was swearing at an officer) "You're not going to be there are you?" Officer gathers himself and says; "You're not going to be there either." Pause; "Yes I am!" Officer; "What?" Corp; "I'm going back (looks at officer out of the top of his eyes)!" Officer; "What?" Corp; "I can't let them go alone....back to that" Officer, nearly speaks, corp interrupts; "You don't understand do you? I can't let them go alone...I'll tell you something though, we'll be waiting, we'll be waiting for you to join us..you won't be alone either!" That's the scene, the plot device would be that someone pulled some strings for the corp. (he could be an infantry soldier..have to see), that..yeah..maybe he was in love with a nurse from a different class and that didn't work out (she was transferred etc.), he had been shell-shocked and developed a great affection for many of the other patients (a group from his own regiment perhaps), ..
"Throughout recent history there has been an endless stream of
eye-witness reports from across the entirety of Britain, which continues
to this day; from the windswept, cold and mountainous regions of
northern Scotland, to the rolling green moors and woodlands of southern
England, there is no shortage of sightings and reports of encounters
with these beasts. Indeed, it may seem that almost every town and
village in Britain has its own legend and local folklore of an unusual
large cat, and there are plenty of farmers who will attest to the damage
these creatures can do.
Britain has a long, colourful and complicated history of having a
diverse exotic pet trade; from the days of the old British Empire, until
the mid-20th century, it was deemed an indicator and symbol of status,
wealth and fashion to own exotic pets, (especially big cats). The
surprising popularity of extravagant exotic cat ownership in Britain is
captured beautifully by the well-known viral video of ‘A Lion called
Christian’; a lion cub purchased in the 1960s from the famous
Knightsbridge department store, ‘Harrods’.
Incidents and reports spiralled out of control in the 1960s; and with
the later introduction of the Dangerous Wild Animals Act in 1976, the
situation only intensified, as exotic cat owners sought to alleviate
themselves of the impending burdens of unfeasibly increased costs to
obtain and retain a license to legally keep their pets. The introduction
of this legislation served as a major catalyst for many unregistered
private big cat owners to deliberately release their animals in
preference of having them terminated." https://www.britainsbigcatmystery.com/
I have been “involved" in this story for many years. My father and step mother's former house (known when a drover's inn as the "Red Cow"), on the banks of the Tawe in the Brecon Beacons, was situated very close to several sightings; Da even reported
to me that a local farmer had either lost control of, or released, a
lurcher when they had spotted what looked like a leopard, the lurcher
did not return and was later found dead. A friend of mine claimed she
had a pug-casting of a big cat having spotted one in the New Forest
(unfortunately it was lost in a house-move), another friend claimed he
saw a cat the size of a medium-sized dog (see documentary re: size of
East Asian leopards), on Southampton Common (where there is a sizeable
deer population).
Quote: "One startled eyewitness was the assistant priest of Itchen
Valley Parish, Rev Alex Pease, who was driving on Chilland Lane when he
spotted the cat in the road on Sunday evening.
Straight away Mr Pease wanted to find out whether anyone else had
seen the feline, and discovered that there had been several sightings in
the Itchen Valley area.
He was convinced he may have seen a genet – a a slender cat-like
carnivore with a long body, a long ringed tail, which is native to
Africa.
Mr Pease said: “When I saw it on Sunday evening it was just after
dark and I was driving along Chilland Lane and pictured it in my
headlights and I thought ‘what on earth is that’.
“I would say it is larger than a normal cat with a much larger and
bushier tail, but the thing was its distinctive black face and pointed
ears.
I have been a frequent visitor to the Dales, Brecon Beacons and New
Forest and now live on top of much semi-rural and wooded land, on the
eastern border of Southampton and south-western border of Eastleigh, so I
keep my eye out for evidence of cats and carry a camera.
Whilst the experts and campaigners worry about the presence of such
animals has anyone considered the veterinary requirements of these apex predators which were "reintroduced"* to Britain in such an ill-considered way? I have
identified “soggy moggy syndrome” as one reason why I have received “bad
vibes” from our countryside on occasion. It is a good job most of our
domestic canines are well cared for too as “Distemper” can also effect
big cats (and that very badly).
Can you imagine what rheumatoid-arthritic conditions do to magnificent
animals such as big cats which rely on their flexibility and agility to survive? What a dreadful thing to inflict on such
beautiful creatures. I would consider leaving baits laced with “Devil”
and/or “Cat’s” Claws** in order to try and ameliorate conditions forced upon these animals as a result of having to live under the climatic
conditions found in these isles. That’s what scepticism imposes too, stay in denial and the animal suffers!
I often wonder how true this is for cryptids (creatures still unknown
to science), and how much we are endangering them by our thoughtless
behaviours. Have you noticed strange silences when out in the woods or (perhaps even
more tellingly), strange bird or animal calls you were not familiar
with as a child? I think I have. One may also find ones-self with a
semi-open mouth washing air over your taste buds and sinuses, I’ve
caught myself doing this on a number of occasions, it’s how big cats
identify areas that have been marked by both other animals and members
of their own species.
*Nb. Quote; "Panthera pardus spelaea, sometimes called the European Ice Age leopard or Late Pleistocene leopard, is a fossilleopardsubspecies, which roamed Europe in the Late Pleistocene. The youngest known bone fragments date to about 32,000 to 26,000 years ago, and are similar in size to modern leopard bones.[1]" .....
" The European Ice Age leopard's skull was medium-long, and its characteristics are closest to the Panthera pardus tulliana subspecies. An apparent depiction of this leopard in the Chauvet Cave
shows a coat pattern similar to that of modern leopards but with a
unspotted belly, presumably white. Like other mammals, leopards from the
cold glacial periods of the Late Pleistocene are usually larger than those from the warm interglacial phases. As in modern leopards, there was a strong sexual dimorphism, with males being larger than females.[1]"
When I aired this subject on the #5Filters message board ("Hosing away the Permanent Bullshit Blizzard of the lamestream media": https://forum.5filters.info/new ), I was not surprised to immediately receive a number of reports of sightings from out cognoscenti, quote; "I’m 99% certain Iz and I saw a big cat in Cornwall back in 2004. We
were off to see Tregeseal stone circle, associated sites, and Carn
Kenidjack - we’d pulled into a layby just off the B3318 and were making
our way down a track towards a farm and as we came around a bend in the
track this creature poured over the 4ft dry stone wall to our right - it
was like black liquid - beautiful and alarming - we both froze, my
whole body tingled with fear and excitement - Iz said she experienced
similar feelings - - quick as a flash it shot off down towards the farm -
- here’s a thing: Iz is a fine photographer, quick on the draw, seldom
phased and a sharp shooter - that day, as usual on such jaunts, her
trusty Pentax was slung over her shoulder - but damn, in that moment,
such was the extraordinary thing we were seeing her reflexes failed her.
Naturally, when we’d collected ourselves we headed off after the
creature - we speculated that it might be a farm dog and would no doubt
greet us with barks when we approached the yard, though I knew that no
dog could have taken that wall with such graceful ease - and no, when we
entered the yard there wasn’t a soul in sight. So we carried on towards
the stone circles - though I must say the next hour or so was
trepidatious to say the least - - ha! we were worried that we might be
set upon by whatever panther-like creature it was that we most surely
saw." .. and ..
"I suspect that we had a black leopard living in,
or at least visiting, the square-mile of secluded quarry land behind my
place. At that time, my two Turkish Shepherd Dogs were strangely keen to
get inside the quarryland fence, then shoot off into the wilderness.
They were never involved in injuries. But at one time when all three of
us were wandering - illicitly - in the quarryland, I believe I saw, just momentarily, in the middle
distance the familiar outline: big as a Labrador, black, long clubbed
tale, definitely a cat…
Leopards in particular are known to have what seem close-to-magical
powers of staying hidden and - completely - unnoticed; lots of
astonishing stories about that, urban leopards in particular.
Some years ago, a completely hidden breeding population of leopards
was discovered, in the Sinai desert. Even local people had not known of
their presence.
Colour me quixotic, but I hope we have, and can sustain, a breeding population of such cats in Britain."
In the documentary “Britain’s Big Cat Mystery” we are told that
interbreeding of populations of mammals (esp. where such animals do not
share a boundary such as do Grizzly Bears and Polar Bears -the
“Pizzly”-, and there has been no establishment of an historical
relationship), do not produce viable males only “mules” (although -apparently -,
females capable of breeding can be), however, we are also told that two
distinct types of big cat have been spotted, these being,
cougars/mountain lions, and the smaller of the black leopards (the East
Asian variety), this suggests that it was from these two gene pools that
the majority of the “domesticated” cats were drawn and that these have
“bred-true”. This explains how and why there may well now (as I
believe), be a viable ongoing breeding population of big cats in our
country. My old friend the Rev. John Knopf (RIP, Minister
Emeritus Edmund Kell Unitarian Church Oxon. Cantab.), was a fund of
information on many subjects and had worked in Africa in the
late 50s early 60s (Kenya -because of his work with the IOC and the Kalenjin
Tribe he was consulted by the author of the book “The Running Tribe”-,
and Nigeria), and he told me a story about leopards in South Africa.
Apparently, some decades ago now, a wildlife sanctuary was transporting a
female leopard as part of a breeding programme, unfortunately, she
escaped whilst they were travelling through Johannesburg, frantic they
immediately launched a recapture mission, however, after they had
caught nine leopards, none of which being the female they were looking
for, they realised that leopards had been living in the city for hundreds of years and nobody knew they were there!
Apparently there is, quote; "Precisely the same story from India, G. Can’t just lay hands on the
source now, but I’m sure it’s findable. Just that I have to go out and
do some out-doors stuff in a minute.
The story was that a man-killing leopard was on the loose in an
Indian city, and lots of baited traps were set out to catch it. I seem
to remember that seven leopards were caught, not one of which had been
known to be in the city before. Urban foxes could take lessons from
them!"
So keep your eyes open but be cautious you don't want this to happen to you (disturbing deer mother's can also be dangerous):
If you do live in an area that you suspect might be supporting a big cat population keep your eye out for pug-marks on trails (big cat tracks are very distinctive, paraphr; "Dog track is like an oval, cat track is -more-, like a circle"):
..especially during wet weather (like that which we have been experiencing this November), and maybe purchase some Plaster of Paris to make a cast:
Quote; "There are some clues that will help
you tell the difference between dog and cat tracks.
Dogs include such species as red and gray foxes,
coyotes, wolves and domestic dogs. Cats include
mountain lions, bobcats, lynx, and domestic cats. Lynx
tracks have some unique features of their own, so are
not treated here. What is said here should apply to
bobcats, mountain lions and domestic cats." Go to: https://www.bear-tracker.com/caninevsfeline.html
Please, however, as I would say about any wild creature you are not specifically and legally hunting for the pot, do not shoot one unless your, or someone else's, life is in danger. Trophy hunting is one of the main reasons why so many species are on the brink of extinction.
Remember the three criteria which are vital for the survival (and esp. maintenance of population), of any (sub-arctic), land based mammalian predator species prey, fresh water and shelter and be aware when you are in an area where (esp.), all three of these conditions are met.
As the experience from South Africa and India shows (see above), simply removing these creatures from the environment is almost certainly going to prove extremely difficult if not impossible. So should our re-wilding efforts include not only the; wolf, bear and lynx but the leopard as well? Given that it would seem that the big cats are already here we should concentrate our efforts on their veterinary concerns. It may well be the case that in order to restore the ecological balance we are ourselves have upset by our ill-considered policies and actions "fast tracking" the re-wilding of the species that re-populated these islands following the last retreat of the ice-sheets, will prove to be necessary.Where that will leave us with regard to the presence of a creature that did not return (of its own volition), to these shores as the ice sheets finally retreated is an ecological question I doubt anyone is currently able to answer (the
musk ox is an interesting case for, if the leopard is to remain,
the presence of an inter-glacial/"intermediate" species might be necessary to
maintain equilibrium*). Climate change not withstanding, in-fact that may be the point, for it is, surely, by direct engagement with natural systems that we learn best how to repair, reinvigorate and rejuvenate our environment and the longest of journeys begin with but a single step.
Perhaps all this simply exemplifies the maxim that, "a leopard cannot change its spots!"
*Nb. "By the Mindel, muskoxen had also reached the British Isles. Both Germany and Britain were just south of the Scandinavian ice sheet
and covered in tundra during cold periods, but Pleistocene muskoxen are
also rarely recorded in more benign and wooded areas to the south like France and Green Spain, where they coexisted with temperate ungulates like red deer and aurochs. Likewise, the muskox is known to have survived in Britain during warm interglacial periods.[12]
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