Kellas Cat

The Kellas Cat is a black feline. It is a small cat found in Scotland. It was named by cryptozoologist Dr Karl Shuker after the village of Kellas in Moray, where it was first found in 1984, when a gamekeeper named Ronnie Douglas shot and killed one. Before then they were usually thought of as mythological, the few sightings dismissed as hoaxes.

The Kellas cat is described as being over 25 inches long, with powerful and long hind legs and a tail that can grow to be around 12 inches long. A specimen is kept in a museum in Elgin.

There was initial media speculation during the early-mid 1980s that the Kellas Cat may be an unclassified species, or at least a subspecies of the European Wildcat. However, in his book "Mystery Cats of the World" (1989), Karl Shuker predicted that it would prove to be an introgressive (complex) hybrid of domestic cat and Scottish wildcat. Eight specimens were subsequently collected and analyzed by Dr Andrew Kitchener of the Royal Museum in Edinburgh. He found that seven of the cats had traits of both house cats and wild cats, suggesting they are indeed most likely hybrids:

Given that both European Wildcats and domestic cats were present in Scotland since at least Roman times, Shuker suggested that the "Cait Sidhe" of Celtic mythology might well be based on folk memory of Kellas Cats.

ee also

* Wild Cat
* British big cats
* Phantom cat

References

*Karl Shuker: Mystery Cats of the World. Robert Hale: London 1989. ISBN 0-7090-3706-6
*Karl Shuker: 'The Kellas cat: reviewing an enigma'. "Cryptozoology", vol. 9, pp. 26-40 (1990)

External links

* " [http://thescotsman.scotsman.com/outdoors/Clawing-back-a-big-cat.2759804.jp Clawing back a big cat theory] " "The Scotsman, article by ALASTAIR ROBERTSON