While everyone calmed down that the mysterious animal from Shumen swam the Danube to the Romanians, scientists proposed the thesis that the track is not of the big cat, but of a dog. And that it may be an urban legend.
According to Professor Nikolay Spasov from the National Museum of Natural History, the version that a black panther roamed the Shumen plateau can be disputed.
„It is very possible that someone who really looks after a pet panther was playing a joke. Today, any good IT specialist can make any combination of footage – "As far as I know, the place is real in the Shumen Plateau, but you can mount anything there, even a giraffe if you want," he explained.
And he said that the animal does not have the habits to hunt, so - released into the wild, it is doomed.
He clearly shows why scientists doubt the version of the roaming black panther. He compared the prints that were found with those of a real panther.
„This paw is the paw of a leopard. It represents what the paw of big cats is like - it is most characteristic with the two furrows in the back of the paw, dogs do not have them, they are characteristic only of cats," he said.
„Here is the paw of the dog - because it is a front paw, it is also concave, the main pad, but it is triangular, not pyramidal, with a convex front part, and the fingers are larger“, explained Prof. Spasov.
And he specified that the track in the Shumen Plateau is of a dog, not a leopard.
If the track is not of a panther, why are there signals that the animal was detected in Romania.
“This with Romania, this is the so-called Snowman Syndrome, of the Yeti. When people expect to see something, they see it“, he explained.