Bedlam as Berlin hunts escaped lion!

NEWS AND VIEWS: Have you read this story? Have you seen the video? When you see the video, you'll see the most appalling quality and you are reliant upon your imagination. That's dangerous. When you have to imagine what an animal is because the image quality is so bad, your mind can run riot and this is what appears to have happened in Berlin, Germany.

Suggestion: if this is a genuine sighting it is likely to be a large dog. That's the common-sense assessment. Wait and see. My expectation is that they won't find any animal let alone a lion! In fact, my most recent thought about this video is that it might have been deliberately created to be fuzzy and to try and attract a lot of attention. Clickbait basically. UPDATE: it was a WILD BOAR. It is an area where there are wild boar in their thousands! Same old story. New media exaggerations and scaremongering.

The video is above and so is a screenshot below and I think that you will agree that, as usual, the quality is very poor. Every time we have a big cat roaming around an urban environment or in the countryside, the image quality is abysmal. That, I think, tells you something about these so-called big cat sightings in places where they shouldn't be.

Bedlam as Berlin hunts escaped lion! Screenshot.

In this instance, helicopters, SWAT teams and wildlife hunters have participated in an extensive police search in Germany last night after, it is alleged, a lioness was spotted roaming the suburbs on the outskirts of Berlin, according to The Times newspaper from which I have borrowed some of their words.

Apparently, witnesses first saw the lion chasing a wild boar down a street in Kleinmachnow which is less than 3 miles from the capital. The sighting occurred in the morning. More sightings followed. Someone made a video and posted it online.

At the time of reporting this the 'beast' is still at large. It was believed to be in a local wood feeding. Residents have been advised to stay indoors and not to let their pets out. More than 200 officers and specialists searched the region using infrared cameras. Drones were also used. Armoured vehicles were in attendance. The police were carrying submachineguns!

There have been no reports of lions escaping zoos or circuses. But the sightings have been in double figures according to the police. The police believe the witness evidence including this incredibly poor-quality video. The mayor of the aforesaid district sought to reassure the public by saying: "To any mockers out there, no this is not our new system of tackling wild boar using lions. We won't be setting up a Serengeti Park here. It's a serious situation and I can only say we still haven't found her." He believes it too!

The district is on the fringes of Berlin and is frequented by wild boar. Entire herds have been seen there. It has been suggested that this is why the lion is in these woods. Kindergartens have remained open but children have been kept indoors. Local traders have been advised to keep their stalls inside.

A local resident who lives in a house close to the woods said: "A colleague sent me a message this morning asking if I was still alive!"

He went out into the streets and cycled to work but he said that his wife had driven their two children to a nearby woodwork class rather than letting them cycle.

The lioness is a mystery. That's the point. It doesn't exist! If this is a large cat it is more likely to be a pet sub adult mountain lion (Puma) in my view. The coloration is correct. Sometimes people keep pumas as pets as they can be somewhat domesticated (correction: the head is too large in the video to be a puma). Or it is a large sandy coloured dog.