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It was the legend that wouldn't go away - perhaps, as one journo put it, because it had nine lives. A black panther stalking the lower reaches of the Illawarra Escarpment, spotted sporadically but most years, in events of varying specificity.
But the repeated sightings near the Sublime Point walking track in Austinmer had been so similar that they boosted each other's credibility.
It helped that I have always been a believer, I must disclose, having grown up not far from Kangaroo Valley where the panther was more than legend.
Solo camping in Morton National Park, the panther was ever-present in thoughts, particularly when one came across caves with bones inside, the remnants of wild meals.
So when local bloke Rob Brown texted to say he'd seen the "panther" in Austinmer, and it was in fact a large feral cat, I was keen.
But a journalist must remain sceptical, and always check out the details. "If your mother says she loves you, check it out", goes the old saying, said to have originated in City News Bureau of Chicago. Ron didn't have any pictures so it all turned on his word.
I know Rob from around the place but we had only spoken a few times. He came across as a thoughtful, smart fellow who doesn't spend much time faking it. And he had no reason to claim something that didn't happen. It was clear he was not a man driven to self-promotion, and had more to fear than to gain. He's turned his Facebook off in the wake of the Page 1 story.
"Mate you would have to have been the WORST person I could have told about this," he gasped after I'd interviewed him, interrogated his claims and his assumptions, and most gallingly, convinced him to be in a photo. And that reluctance added to his credibility. Plus, of course, he was debunking the idea that it was a panther - it was clearly a feral cat, he said, and had been within about three metres of the thing as it jumped from a tree at his eye height.
He was also great talent, in possession of a fine turn of phrase. The cat sounded like "someone throwing a wheelbarrow through a palm tree", which as we all know is a standard measure of sound. Later he said it was like someone throwing 20 litres of water through a palm tree - which at least gives us a precise estimate of the cat's weight. The tail was "bushy-ish, not like fluffy cat fluffy, but not thin like dog fur". The feline was "black as the ace of spades. Totally black. No other colour on it".
His response was pretty normal - almost forgetting to be worried.
"I wasn't frightened - I instantly went 'let's go and have a look' ... and then I thought 'maybe we shouldn't'. So we scarpered down the track."
If our job is to interrogate claims and judge credibility, Rob's stood up. I was satisfied he'd solved the mystery of the big cat. I like to walk that track too, and I'm not sure how I feel about this outcome - a perhaps-not-real panther is somehow less scary than a definitely-real feral feline which has picked its territory as a spot popular with fitness walkers.
So farewell, panther. Your new identity makes more sense in myriad ways. How had a panther survived so long, for instance, and if these sightings were descendants of the original "circus escapee", as the theory went, where were all the others? Plausibility and credibility are working together. Now I'm going to have to find a nice big bushwalking stick.
- Ben Langford, Illawarra Mercury environmental journalist
Read more of our black panther coverage over the years: