La Cala cougar may be back in Andalucia

IN the most eagerly anticipated return since Take That, Andalucia’s La Cala Cougar could be back in the area, after a potential sighting in Mijas.

First spotted by an eagle-eyed Olive Press reader in October 2007, the black panther was finally caught on camera a year later in Mijas Costa before going off the radar for over half a decade.

Now, after a long time in the shadows, the cougar may have resurfaced after cat-lover Marion Lancaster spotted a monster-moggy while on holiday in the region.

“I was not frightened or excited at the time. But when I got home and researched the cat I realised I should have been very, very frightened,” she told the Olive Press.

“I would like to stress that it was not a normal cat, not even a big cat. I had a cat for 15 years and he was a big cat, people often remarked on his size.”

Lancaster, 71, from London, came into contact with the feline whilst holidaying in Mijas’ Urbanisation Dona Pillar.

In an act of bravery, she got within 10 yards of the beast before it ‘trailed off into the countryside towards the mountains and hills in the distance’.

“It came out of nowhere as if being chased or chasing something and then it just stopped,” she said.

“At first I thought it was a ‘normal’ cat but as it presented itself in front of me I could see that it was a heavy animal, with strong legs, much larger than I first thought. It was what I would consider to be the size of a puma.”

Lancaster described the cat as being three times the size of a normal cat with patches of brown/ black and yellow/ tan fur, similar to that of a tortoise shell.

Initial reports of the cougar in 2007 and 2008 led to a police search – accompanied by 20 dogs – after a pig farmer in El Canuelo, near Campillos reported over a dozen of his pigs had been slain.