AN enormous paw print found on a car near Bringsty Common has left its owner in no doubt a large cat is prowling the area.

Businessman Steve Marshall said he discovered the mark - left by an animal with a 7cm by 9.5cm oval paw print - on his 4x4 vehicle earlier this month.

The vehicle was parked at the Bringsty Common smallholding where Mr Marshall, of Whitbourne, runs a T-shirt business.

He said he thought the cat had been sitting on the roof waiting for rabbits to appear from under a shed, before pouncing and leaving two black paw prints, a foot apart, on the bonnet and the skim of a part print on the vehicle's bumper.

"Although I'm a businessman, I'm a country bumpkin," he said.

"I know what a cat print looks like. It's certainly not a dog print because dog paws have got a funny shape at the base of their foot, like a 'T' upside down.

"This has an oval central part with little things around the side."

Bob Lawrence, head warden of West Midlands Safari Park, said the print could possibly be that of a leopard or jaguar, which it is claimed has been seen around the Malvern area.

Mr Marshall said he also found a very strong, inch long, off-white hair lodged in his wiper.

In April last year a Ledbury man came face to face with a black cat, the size of an Alsatian, in woods near his home, while the previous January a Kempsey couple reported seeing a large cat in a field.

In 1998, casts were taken of paw prints after a sighting in Cradley, and in 1999 a motorist saw a large cat in Upper Colwall.