Will The Real Scottish Wild Cat Please Stand Up

Perhaps the easiest demonstration of how the Scottish wild cat has been depicted and the new wild tabby backed by dogma has become the 'real' thing are Cigarette and Tea packet cards. These were single cards placed inside a brand of cigarette or tea and could be collected into albums. It was a craze before Pokemon!

The art was either commissioned or permission gained to use the work of some of the top artists in the field and so accuracy was guaranteed -these were, after all, also meant to educate.

Let's take a look at some of the cards depecting the Scottish wild cat from my collection.

 1939: The cat looks similar to those photographed by M. H. Batten at the time but there are striking differences (see The Red Paper Felids for the Batten photos)Some of the yellowish ground colouration of the Old wild cat but definitely a hybrid (remember Scottish naturalists and the man considered the expert on wild cats having studied them over 40 years declared (in 1898) that the true wild cat was extinct by the 1860s)

1958: Now this card is interesting in that this bears the closest resemblance to the Old wild cat and was painted by the highly respected C. F. Tuncliffe, R.A. so it is possible that he had seen taxidermy Old wild cats at some point

Archibald Thorburn 1860-1935 another much respected wildlife artist whose paintings of foxes and wild cats is exquisite. The first is from 1912 and the second just before (?)

Archibald Thorburn 1860-1935

Archibald Thorburn 1860-1935: Thorburn was a stickler for detail so this ought to make the Reader realise that by the early 1900s into the 1920s something was going on with wild cats as their appearances were changing and no doubt because hybridisation was (as stated even in 18th century sources)  the only thing keeping wild cats in existence. And there was no control over poisoning, snaring, shooting or trapping then bludgeoning wild cats. One local man proudly boasted to having killed over 50 wild cats in his local area.

1921 and we see the traits of the Old wild cat therefore someone must have seen one  at some point (stuffed in a museum?).  Similar markings are seen in the 1920s Batten wild cat photos.

1972 and a photo card showing some wild cat traits but this is clearly an hybrid.

1987 and, mysteriously, the "wild tabby" was the Scottish wild cat! Bearing no resemblance to either the OId wild cat or even those of the 1900-1920s period. The reason was simply "trendyness". The Royal connection (Victoria and Albert) to Scotland boosted most everything Scottish so that the country became a tourist hot spot and add tartan to anything and it sold. 

The big museums -such as the Natural History Museum (London) were sent a wild tabby and every museum curator after that had  to get one the same. It became the "Museum Type" and if wild cats killed and sent to museums were not a match they were dumped or returned. Of every museum I contacted in England, Scotland and Wales from local to national I was told the same thing: all of their specimens were acquired in 1900 or just after -basically, wild cats were being shot en masse to fill museum and "distinguished" private persons' collections.

There is a massive jump from the Old wild cat (the ones dying out in the 1860s were probably 4th (?) generation) to the wild tabby. Naturalists and zoologists just did no research. The archives are there and freely available while the art and photographs are everywhere and they quite clearly show the big changes.

I could actually add even more images of "true Scottish wild cats" and they -and those above- are all accurate and they would just spin heads.

Dogma has meant that for the last 100+ years the public as well as those being educated in zoology, etc. have been taught dogma.  'Facts' copied by one person after another and without those people doing any research and discovering the openly available facts for themselves. It is a parallel to the Old and New fox situation -and not just in the UK.

All images (c)2023 British Wild Cats and Feral Study