Around the World in Cat Cryptids, from Alaska to Zanzibar

While I wish I could say that Alien Big Cats, or ABCs, hail from outer space, in fact, they’re just British. This is the term used for cats resembling lions, leopards, cougars, etc., spotted in the United Kingdom, where there are no native big cats. We’ll get into some specific varieties later in this list.

This feline, spotted like a leopard but maned like a lion — also barking like a dog! — has been spotted (see what I did there?) by people from the Ubangi region of the Central African Republic. Could a leopard and a lion have bred? Is it a heretofore unknown species of hyena? Whatever it is, it’s a bakanga!

This amazingly named cryptid hails from the White Mountains of New England. A little critter with kitten-soft fur, it will rush up on you, stop inches away, and spit before scurrying off. This animal was first named in the 1939 book Fearsome Critters. 

European big game hunters who traversed the wilds of Africa around the turn of the 20th century reported some very strange creatures, including the dingonek. Described as a “jungle walrus,” the dingonek has a head like a saber-toothed cat, armor like an armadillo, and a fin tail like a dolphin. You know those hunters and fishermen, always telling you about the one that got away…

Some cryptids are animals presumed to be extinct, but some people hold onto hope. The Eastern Cougar is one such cryptid, considered a subspecies of the cougar known to the Western US. This subspecies was proposed in 1946 but declared extinct in 2011. Still, thousands of people in the Eastern US have claimed to spot cougars since the 1960s.

Here’s an alien big cat! Or maybe a bear. The four girls who saw this fearsome beast in 1997 couldn’t be sure. They saw something about four feet tall and jet-black eating a pheasant and ran. When they came back, they found big paw prints. Several more reports followed.

Glawackus belongs to the realm of fearsome critters, creatures reported by lumberjacks in 19th and 20th century America. With a cackle like a hyena and a body like a bear-lion-panther hybrid, the glawackus will wipe your memory if you look into its eyes. Last spotted in 1939 in Glastonbury, Connecticut.

The Classic of Mountains and Seas is a Chinese classic text that compiles mythological creatures. You may have heard of mythological creatures like the nine-tailed fox from books like Wicked Fox, but the text also mentions the Huan, a one-eyed cat with three tails. It can mimic the sounds of other animals.

This water tiger creature hails from Patagonia in South America. First described by an Argentine naturalist in 1898 as something like a jaguar-otter hybrid, it’s also big enough to drag a horse underwater. Curiously, the anthropologists trying to track this creature down did not find the word “iemisch” consistent with any Patagonian language.

Also called the Jangsan tiger, this cryptid is a recent addition to the list, first spotted in 2010 in South Korea. The creature is a quadruped, larger than a human, whose white hair covers its face. Its front legs are longer than its back legs, like a sloth, but it moves quickly and makes horrifying noises. If you’re intrigued, check out the 2017 Korean horror film called The Mimic.

Another alien big cat! Or rather, a smallish one. And not really a cryptid anymore? The Kellas cat, named after the Scottish village where it was found, is a black cat that is a hybrid of a domestic housecat and a Scottish wildcat. This cat was thought to be mythological until one was captured in a snare in 1984.

What a name, right? It’s also called the devil cat for its horns, the nightshade bear for its massive size, and the hoo-hoo for its eerie call. It hails from the Ozark region of the United States, and a television station in Arkansas received photos of one as recently as 2015. The Arkansas Game and Fish Commission claimed the photos were a hoax. More on the howler below.

Picture it: Bladenboro, North Carolina, December 1954. A farmer reports his dog was dragged away by a cat-like beast and then found, blood drained. More reports of dead livestock follow, but then things settle down. The beast struck again in 2007, prompting an investigation from the show MonsterQuest. They conclude, confusingly, that the beast is an Eastern Cougar, a different cryptid on this very list.

Yule Cat! In Iceland, the fierce Yule Cat stalks the countryside, ready to attack people who don’t have new clothes to wear before Christmas Eve. For knitters and crocheters like myself, this cryptid is the threat we need to make sure our loved ones receive their handmade gifts on time. That is, in fact, the theory for the origins of the story, as people needed strong encouragement to finish processing the fall wool harvest.