Rex & Heather Gilroy - Research of the Australian (Marsupial) Panther

Rex Gilroy hopes to inspire other future researchers to follow his example and dare to question long-established dogmas of our prehistory and, like him, reveal evidence for long-hidden mysteries about which the scientific establishment would prefer we knew nothing.
Excerpts from the 1995 & 2003 Updated version of Mysterious Australia - PART THREE - Cryptozoological Mysteries -Chapter 9 - Do Panthers Roam the Australian Bush? Chapter 10 . Mystery Lions of the Blue Mountains.

Excerpts from the 2006 Book Out Of The Dreamtime - The Search For Australasia's Unknown Animals. Part Three – Lions and tigers of the Australian Bush. Chapter Seven – What is the Queensland Tiger? Chapter Eight – Australia’s Mysterious Marsupial Lions – Meat-Eaters of the Miocene. Chapter Nine – The “Australian Panther” – Big Cats of the Bushland.

Rex & Heather Gilroy

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Rex and Heather Gilroy-Australia's Top 'Unexplained' Mysteries Research Team. Photos & Text copyright (c) Rex & Gilroy Heather 2010
• Research of Rex & Heather Gilroy -Panther Research Tasmania - More Stories Up June 2010

What is the Tasmanian Panther?

Copyright © Rex Gilroy 2003

For reasons to follow, the ‘panther’ can only be a marsupial and a carnivore. Therefore there remains only the problem of its actual place in the marsupial family. I personally believe that, when eventually one of these creatures is available for study, it will be found to belong either with, or a close relative of, the Marsupial Lions.

The Australian Miocene-Pliocene-Pleistocene fossil records have lately revealed a wide range of hitherto unknown marsupial species, particularly the marsupial lions. If the fossil remains of an animal fitting the general physical description of the ‘panther’ has not been uncovered at the time of writing this book, then I believe its discovery is inevitable.

The number of case-histories of ‘Australian Panther’ sightings is voluminous and far too extensive to be adequately covered in this chapter, although the reports to follow, selected from every Australian state, should give the reader plenty of food for thought on this mystery.

We begin our search in Tasmania, the island state mostly associated with the ‘extinct’ Thylacine; and yet this island has its own ‘panther’ traditions. Prior to the flooding of the Bass Strait land-bridge toward the close of the last great ice-age about 12,000 years ago, no natural barrier existed to prevent these animals from entering Tasmania, and it is evident that today, isolated from their mainland counterparts, a good many of these marsupial carnivores continue to survive there.

Great Western Tiers, south-west of Launceston 1928

Copyright © Rex Gilroy 2003

The author frequently receives such tales from widely-scattered and remote regions of Australia, and many of these reports often concern the loud, weird, screeching sounds made by these animals.

In 1928, in the Great Western Tiers, south-west of Launceston, a group of roadworkers were terrified in their camp one night, by the incessant howling and screaming sounds of two or three unseen creatures. The men were convinced the area was inhabited by “jungle cats”, and refused to stay there another night!

Outside Strathgordon, west of Lake Gordon 1940

Copyright © Rex Gilroy 2003

In 1940 outside Strathgordon, west of Lake Gordon in the wild bush country of south-western Tasmania, a farmer and his wife spotted a “seven-foot-length, giant, panther-like animal” [2.13m], as it dashed across their back paddock, and leapt effortlessly over a six foot [1.83m] fence before disappearing into trees.

Ben Lomond National Park 1961

Copyright © Rex Gilroy 2003

Craig Black, a young fossicker, was digging in a creek in Ben Lomond National Park one day in 1961, when he realised he was being watched by a large black ‘panther’ from among bushes, further up the creek on the opposite bank. The animal emerged, then dashed across the shallow creek. It was apparently a female.

Snowy Range West of Hobart January 1972.

Copyright © Rex Gilroy 2003

Tom Forester, a camper, was with two mates exploring the Snowy Range west of Hobart one weekend in January 1972. On this particular Sunday morning they all spotted a large, black-furred cat-like animal observing them from the edge of dense scrub nearby their camp. They had no sooner got to their feet than the creature turned to vanish quickly into the trees. The men later found large paw prints embedded in soil near their camp, suggesting the animal had been there the previous night.

Later that afternoon Tom went to get water from a creek. As he crouched on the creeks’ edge beneath a tall boulder, he saw a dark shadow reflected in the water. Before he could turn to look up, he was thrown aside as the dark shape leapt upon him with a screech, and then bounded across the creek into bushland. A shocked, badly scratched Tom staggered back to camp. Soon afterward his startled friends went in search of the mystery animal, but it had left the area.

In April 1989 a group of a dozen people saw a black-furred panther-like animal, about two metres in length from head to tail, and standing up to 0.6 of a metre on all fours, as it moved along the shore of Lake Gordon in the Mt Wright area, north of the Snowy Range.

• Reports - Sightings From the 1995 Book Mysterious Australia * Click Here *
• Original Newspaper Accounts * Click Here *
• The Best Sightings * Click Here *
• Theories - The Case For a Marsupial Cat * Click Here *
• Timeline of Sightings * Click Here *
• Expeditions Australia Wide * Click Here *
• Drawings * Click Here *
• Plaster Casts * Click Here *
• Compilation of Descriptions of Eyewitnesses * Click Here *
• Radio Interviews * Click Here *
• Television Interviews * Click Here *
• Newspaper Interviews * Click Here *
• Reports - Sightings From Out Of The Dreamtime - The Search For Australasia's Unknown Animals * Click Here *
• Message Board - Report a Sighting Australia Wide * Click Here *
State By State Sighting Reports
• Panther Research New South Wales * Click Here *
• Panther Research Victoria * Click Here *
• Panther Research Queensland * Click Here *
• Panther Research Northern Territory * Click Here *
• Panther Research Western Australia * Click Here *
• Panther Research South Australia * Click Here *
• Panther Research A.C.T (Canberra) * Click Here *
• Panther Research Tasmania * Click Here *
Reports on Panther Activity by Government Departments

• NSW Agriculture Report on information available on the reported large black cat in the Blue Mountains. Prepared by: Bill Atkinson, Agricultural Protection Officer * Click Here *

• Legislative Assembly - Thursday 22 May 2003 * Click Here *
• Australian Zoos * Click Here *
Internet Reports
• Message Boards * Click Here *
• Newspaper Reports * Click Here *
• Blog Reports * Click Here *
Photographs/Video/Video Stills/Drawings
• Large Cats * Click Here *
• Feral Cats * Click Here *
• Private Zoos * Click Here *
• You-Tube * Click Here *
When Animals Attack
• Attacks involving lions or tigers in Australia since 1980 * Click Here *
Contact Rex & Heather Gilroy
• New Email: randhgilroy44@bigpond.com

Rex & Heather Gilroy - Research of the Australian (Marsupial) Panther -Sighting Reports

Kangaroo Valley: If, as I maintain, we are dealing with a still unknown species of giant marsupial cat related to Thylacoleo, then we can cancel out the 'panther' feral cat theory. Undoubtedly, feral cats make up a large percentage of Kangaroo Valley 'panther' reports, but a comparison of physical descriptions and plaster casts of 'panther' paw-prints certainly distinguishes this animal from any feral cat.
Rex & Heather Gilroy
Rex and Heather Gilroy-Australia's Top 'Unexplained' Mysteries Research Team.
Photos & Text From mysterious Australia copyright (c) Rex & Gilroy Heather 2010
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