Tiger King's Carole Baskin has offered safety tips following the "clearest ever" photograph of a UK "big cat" prowling the British countryside.

The muscular beast was pictured laying in some long grass in Smallthorne, Staffordshire, and experts have said if genuine it is ''probably the best photo of a British big cat that exists''.

The picture was unearthed by the assistant director of a center for zoology when he was working in their archives.

READ MORE: 'Clearest ever' photo of UK 'big cat' on the prowl proves muscular beast 'exists'

And now Carole Baskin has weighed in during an interview on Jeremy Kyle on TalkTV, saying that she doesn't think it is a panther, as stated by the makers of a new documentary called Panthera Britannia who uncovered the shot.

She said: "I think it’s very likely that it is a black leopard because I’ve worked with big cats for the past 40 years and the smartest cats bar none are the leopards and the black leopards just disappear into the landscape.

"By the time you get your camera up, they’re gone. They can be right in front of you and you wouldn’t even know they were there."

Reacting to fear that people have that a big cat could be prowling the countryside, Carole said it likely wouldn't harm any people or their pets.

"I don’t think people need to worry about their pets. No leopard wants to get into it with a house cat because they recognise that that’s going to be a fight," Baskin explained.

• 

  Horror in North Korean jails tells of the possible fate of US army defector Travis King

"They don't want some yappy little dog because that's more trouble than they need. They have plenty of prey out in the wild they can go after."

On the safety of humans, she added: "If you were to find yourself face to face with a cat, don’t run because then you're going to look like prey."

"So you should try to make yourself look as big as possible. In my case, and I wouldn’t recommend this to people… but in my case if I have to approach one of our cats I will step towards them and show them I am in charge."

"Even though they’re so much bigger and stronger than I am, they must think there’s something wrong with me for doing that and they’ll kind of like, back off."

To stay up to date with all the latest news, make sure you sign up to one of our newsletters here.

Source: Read Full Article