Oak Bay residents are being advised that a cougar was spotted in the area, roaming a residential street early on Tuesday morning.
The big cat was seen walking along the sidewalk in the 2900-block of Henderson Road in Oak Bay at approximately 6:15 a.m. on Tuesday morning.
“I thought it was a large dog at first,” said Sunni Anthony, a Henderson Road resident.
She described the cat as moving “slow and methodically” and said it was the height of the wheel well on her family’s Ford F-150 truck.
“It was massive, I’ve never seen anything like it,” Anthony told CHEK News.
With Anthony’s kids having to go to school soon after the sighting, she said she phoned 911 to inform Oak Bay Police about the cougar.
The cougar then darted close to her home and by the time she had called police, it had disappeared into another yard and out of sight.
Oak Bay Police responded to the scene by approximately 6:30 a.m., patrolling the intersection around Henderson Road and Neil Street, alerting walkers nearby about the cougar.
Anthony described the sighting as “frightening,” having been the first time she’s spotted a big cat in her neighbourhood in person.
“It’s one thing to hear about it, but it’s another thing to see it,” Anthony recounted.
As of early afternoon, police are still trying to track down where the cat may have gone.
Graham Cox
