The Northern Mystery Animals Group journal tabulated the better documented Northumberland big cat reports in November 1997. According to a chapter on exotic cats in the book Mammals, Amphibians and Reptiles of the North East (Natural History Society of Northumberland, 2012), 37 reports were collated from January 1995 to October 1997. Of those, 26 were of big black cats, often described as black panthers, five were of pumas, and the rest were singles including lynx, ocelot, bobcat, leopard and wildcat plus one alleged corpse.
The chapter's author notes that reports were mainly from the Elsdon, Kirkwhelpington and Harwood Forest area, with a second cluster around Hexham and Haydon Bridge and some from Morpeth. Pumas and black panthers were reported in the same places.
The same chapter is cautious. It says the existence of exotic cats turning up in Britain is not disputed in a few well documented cases, but that big cat sightings in the region are often assumed to be pumas because of the Durham Puma, even though the animal described is usually black and black pumas have never been definitively recorded anywhere. It also notes a cast from Northumberland identified as puma by a tracker in the late 1990s, without further detail. This entry covers the cluster of reports, not any single sighting, so the pin is an approximate centre for the area.
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