The Essex Beast - totally unprepared, we hunt..

nick here, just a quick update,
went up site 1 today(i know i said i'd learnt but insanity keeps callin me!) to walk mutley,this time i was armed with a massai spear(after consulting my 'excuses to the police' handbook i found no viable reason why i should be walking through the essex countryside with this.....but they had to catch me first right?,and i'd rather be arrested than eaten!)so i was prepared in a point at each end kinda stylee!
alas i didn't see anything untoward(apart from noticing the badgers head had disappeared...?).
after a lengthy search of the immediate area around the b.h site, i found what appeared to be a natural
den like construction!? whilst consulting my brain to see if it wanted to have a look, something heavy sounding bolted from the back area of the den!!! in a flash i was round the back and runnin after
whatever it was(i think my spear gave me an air of nonchalence),it was very quick...very large sounding...and i didn't see anything over the bracken as i was on the chase? badger? surely not in
daylight....and it wasn't a sett for sure..deer? as i said i couldn't get a visual(have to stop eating those
weird looking fungi) and in my experience deers leap as they are runnin from danger(especially through
thigh rasping bracken!).......the beast???

Nick here, just got back from a walk up site 1, thought i'd take my dog(crazycollie) for a wander incase there were any new developments (i know, foolish on my own, but i was feeling dispensible/brave...don't know which?)
i took a different route to check out two waterholes shown on the map,thinking it would be an ideal time to look for footprints as it had rained alot lately. After looking around, then pretending to be a scarecrow whilst the farmer drove by, i decided to move on to where i'd seen the previous 'prints'.
I took the field walk partly to check for 'kills' and partly to have ample reaction time-just in case!
As we approached the first wood my dog stopped,she didn't seem too keen on the wood and after vigorous sniffing and wimpering started edging back into the field? Funnily enough this has only ever happened once before on our walks together,after finding the deer carcass,and funnily enough(although i was struggling to find the 'funny side' by now)it was the same patch of wood!
Then for about ten minutes,what seemed like all the birds and pheasants in the wood started shrieking together,this scared mutley even more and started to put me on edge,so i stood back and waited eyes ever alert!
All of a sudden they stopped in unison! I would stand up in court(so would my pants if i'd of stayed there much longer)and swear on oath that i heard footprints in the wood,not being able to see anything at human/deer level i looked at mutley and in a strangely comical moment(especially if she could talk)we froze,then panicked,then ran!
My primal instinct kicked in and seemed to be yelling 'look behind you'(unfortunately not that easy when running across a muddy, tractor rutted field!)
We stopped after two fields and scanned the area........nothing!
I've never known my dog to move so 'quickly' back to the van after a walk,she normally dawdles trying to enjoy every last second-not today,and i must admit i was quite happy about that!
What 'it' was i can only surmise,but theres alot of 'coincedences' going on down there,i've certainly learnt two things today-never walk down there on your own,and always trust a dog's senses above your own-even if it gives you heartburn,nausea and a twisted ankle!! Now wheres the phone number for that gym..........

OK, Si here, quick update - check this out. Nick is in the Woods near Badgers Head, He's just rang me to say the dogs freaking out, won't go near the woods and theres all sorts of wierd noises in there.. Just wanted to post this incase he gets 'chomped' you heard it here first :)
I'll keep it updated when I hear more, If all is fine (I hope!) Nick can update later....
Cross your fingers.

nick here,
thought i'd tell you about our latest jaunt on friday nite....
Myself,Si and Kev decided to try another 'beast' stake out, this time we were prepared! Having swotted-up all week on big cat facts-behaviour,hunting moves, growls and calls etc(the latter giving us the heebie-jeebies even in the relative safety of kevs car). We were also better equiped, instead of machete's and flame throwers we opted for the king of all spotlights(this baby would guide a mothership down to earth to within a cats whisker,ahem....no pun intended)purchased by kev-(the guys more prepared than a tessa's ham salad sandwich!),and a round each of beef,mushroom and mayo sarnies, and of course the obligatory flask of QT(a life saver in its own right!)
So back to the "badgers head"-site 1,all we saw were some rabbits, a few fallow deer and some weird green dots floating around in the sky(quickly deduced as my inability to stop pointing the beam in Si and Kevs eyes-ok....so i found it amusing!)-we decided to move on.
We circled the area thought to be the 'beasts' haunt, stopping at various fields en-route to give them a quick sweep with the spotlight, after seeing a few more deers,and alot of rabbits-we stumbled on a curious beast-a muntjack deer-to which Kev in particular took a strange liking to,he seemed to be salivating whilst tying a napkin around his neck!-never has there been a more edible looking creature!! after a long winded cookery discussion,we took 5 to re-access our mission,and eat our sarnies(possibly the one thing that saved the muntjack!)
Although it seemed a pointless night, we reassured ourselves that it only takes one fresh print or glimpse of the beast to put us hot on its tail-and obviously alot of patience-several bucket loads in fact! Then comes the "cat-trap"! something we'll discuss when the time comes.....and when we've found a "friendly butcher"- if indeed such a thing exists!?

OK, so whats been happening lately. Well, we decided we should get back out there and scope the area. SO.. about 2:00am one Saturday morning I hooked up with Nick and Kev and drove down to badgers head. We got out the car and looked over the first field next to the woods. Nervous as hell we shone the car lights over the field and two glowing eyes shone back from the far end.. Gulp, then as we watched there was another pair. Not wanting to get too excited Kev (always prepared this guy.. you will see..) brought out his binoculars. (good thinking that man) As I looked down the field in the dark, I spotted a light 'blob' no wait, two pairs of eyes - one body!! A f*cking two headed alien with STALK NECKS!! WOT? No - the pairs of eyes parted and in the end we concluded it was two deer... The next move was to walk down to badgers head. We didn't have any weapons apart from a few tiny lock knives, probably not much of a match for ten centimeter razor claws and the massive K9's of a 80 pound cougar!! As we got further in to the field we all got considerably more uncomfortable. When we finally got to Badgers head we were close to the woods and far from the safety of the car. I could imagine the beast staring from the woods thinking about what my face might taste like. The walk back to the car was more than a little quicker than the walk there and I reckon everyone was a bit happier when we arrived. We checked some other field out and drove to our (mine and Kevs) original sighting a few years ago. Nothing out of the ordinary tonight, although Nicks flask of QT was particularly tasty!!

The Next week (last week) Nick was working near some farms and had a chat with the farmer. The farmer reckoned that in all his 35 years in the fields he had never seen or heard of anything killing or eating a badger. In fact he reckoned even dead badgers just stay and rot, nothing ever tries to munch on them. Hmmm... Theres more from yesterday, but I need to get to bed - perhaps I'll let Nick fill in the next chapter..... Bye for now.

11th nov 2003

After being talked about so much, i thought i'd better do some talking myself!
Nick here, (the one with the hypocollie)! i returned to the badger site today,armed with a digital camera(i thought long and hard about the boots/police saga an decided to trash the film!)and ready to get sum evidence.
still feels eerie down there,although it was easier not having a 'buddy' scaring the bejesus out of me,so i didnt stay that long. i got some photos of some large pawprints,scat and 2 killsites,one the badger and the other a pheasant-the feathers not only appeared to be ripped off but also sliced halfway up,culda been a fox i know but its within 100meters of the badger and quite messy so its worth considering.
after getting some snaps i decided to skirt the whole area in my van,find out any other ways in etc,unfortunately its real hard looking and driving so as you can imagine i was chugging along quite slowly and the policeman followin decided i was casing potential jobs-hence he pulled me over! anyway after a long embarrasing conversation(you try explainin that your looking for a big cat possibly a puma to a guy whos got you down as a thief or even worse!),we finally got things sorted out without the need for back-up,and it turns out he was called to a puma siting just last month in brentwood! a kid had phoned the police saying he'd seen a puma-like animal by a ditch just outside brentwood,when the officer got to the scene he found a mutilated deer carcass in the ditch! i tried to get some more info out of him but he turned to go muttering that he had motorists to fine or something?! typical! the quest continues.....

Well, we checked out as much as we could on the net about the prints and the 'scat' on the net.. (by the way - don't type puma scat into google if your easily offended!) amongst the wierdo porn sites we actually found nature sights with field guides. We found pics of badger poo, yep we had seen some of that. Managed to find pics of deer crap, yep seen plently of that on the fields, Dog sh*te we knew, rabbit, yep, fox, yep know that one (and the smell - My old dog used to love rolling about in it!!) So we had one unidentified left, and the biggest mound. When finally finding photos of Puma scat, guess what.... Yep almost identical.
Then on to the prints. Same again, most easy to identify - but we had seen a couple of prints that were very close to big dog prints, but without the claw marks. They weren't substantial, I think we need some more rain and mud for that so we won't put a tick next to that yet.

Now my friend also went back to take photos of all these in the daylight... and I thought it would be funny to creep up on him and make a noise like a puma. SO, I knew he was out, and the van parked in the usual spot mean't he was probably deep in the woods with his mutt. I parked up and started to creep into the woods. I was going so quietly and stealthily I started to freak myself out, every noise gave me the creeps!! - in fact I cuoldn't wait to catch up with my friend. Eventually I saw him in the distance. I huddled down by a bush and waited for him to get closer... When close enough I cupped my hands over my mouth and made the worlds most pathetic puma growl ever. In hindsight I should have practiced, In fact I didn't even know what the hell a panther sounded like, and my growl sounded more like the muppet 'Animal' when he opens his mouth and his eyes bulge out. Sort of a 'YEEeeaaaaaaHHH' Still, it was loud and I could see him stop in his tracks and freeze. I made another growl, this one more of meaty one - not unlike the wierd short guy from the police academy film, or Yoda.. Anyway, he looked pretty terrified and I couldn't stop laughing so I came out from my spot and luckily he saw the funny side.

He had taken photos of all the different sh*t, The badgers severed head, and prints. To be able to measure the prints he had put his open lock knife next to them when taking the photos. OK, so now he didn't have a digital camera, so he was gonna take these to Boots to get developed... Until I pointed out that the poeple at boots were gonna see severed heads, loads of sh*t and a knife.. And would probably phone the Police...

So then last week, I (fascinated by this new turn of events) went with him to walk his dog, and to see the area he spoke about with the Deer story. Well, we were in the area, and as we came out of a clearing in the woods we saw something furry on the ground, not too big.. "Well well well" said my friend, "What have we here!!". As we got closer we discovered it was, infact, a BADGERS HEAD!! Completely intact, but chewed off at the neck... actually quite a gruesome discovery!! My friend flipped it over and unfortunately maggots were bulging out of its eye socket - and some other nasty crawly things. That wasn't too bad - but then came the smell!! I nearly gagged and we got away from it pretty quickly.
Talking about it more, we couldn't think of anything that would prey on a badger. I don't think they have any enemies apart from the odd stupid human. But even a dog would have a job to sever its head off like that. There was some fur in the area, but no body. And we did a pretty thorough search. Eaten we reckon...
So next we look for prints. To be honest, we know f*ck all about prints. So as it was muddy we compared them all from around the area, got his dog to stand still while we squished its paws in the mud. (a young collie.. not as easy as it sounds!!) and made a note of all the shapes, sizes and claw marks etc.. We did find some that were rather big and suspicious, but we left it at that and went home to dig up some 'footprint' info on the net...

TBC

OK - So a few months ago, a friend of mine was walking his dog around some woods in essex (not far from the spot we previously saw the 'beast') and discovered a Deer that had been torn to bits by something. Mostly eaten and as if it had been 'dragged' along quite a way...

Well, Where to start!! About 5 or 6 years ago a friend and I were sitting by the A12 in essex about dusk, and to our complete amazement saw a huge black silhouette creeping around the nearby field.. (remember my american friends, this is the UK - the scariest things we have here are badgers.. nuff said) It was much bigger than a fox but had the typical big cat tail curving out and up like a big 'S' We watched this thing for about ten minutes and then tried to creep up on it. Yeah I know, probably a dumb thing to do, but as we got closer it took off. The next week in the local paper was a report by a local policeman who had to stop his car approximately the same position on the A12 and watched what he called 'a Lion' walk past. That was the start of it. I have collected masses of sighting reports around the essex area, I won't post them here will will add links later (just wanna get this off the ground to get to the exciting bits!) That was the last I bothered with it .... until now!!