AN ALLEGED panther sighting has been caught on camera after a “rather large” cat was spotted stalking a Caerphilly park.

One reader was left “in disbelief” after spotting a “wild cat” walking across the mountainside in Penallta.

The footage was taken around a month ago by Liam Cooper, who said he spotted the beast while in work.

After a colleague suggested the animal could be a big cat – even a panther – he grabbed his phone to record the footage before the animal disappeared behind some trees.

Just this week, BBC naturalist Iolo Williams refused to rule out the possibility that big cats could be living and breeding in the more remote wooded areas of Wales.

“But just because I’ve never actually clapped eyes on one living in the wild doesn’t mean to say that they are definitely not around,” he told our sister title the Tivyside Advertiser.

“Big cats are by nature incredibly shy and elusive and will go out of their way to remain concealed from sight.

“Having said that, over the years I must have tramped tens of thousands of miles across all parts of Wales and in all that time I’ve never come across any evidence that these things are actually out there.

“If there was indeed a population of big cats living and breeding in our countryside you’d have thought we’d find far more sheep carcases lying about – and obvious prey such as pheasants would be massacred in their hundreds.”