Budapest - Animal welfare experts and hunters have launched a search for a black panther reported to be on the loose in eastern Hungary, local mayor Kalman Jozsa said Wednesday.
Authorities have been hunting for the panther, which may have escaped from a private owner, since Sunday, when it was first spotted by a 10-year-old boy and his family, said Jozsa, mayor of the eastern village of Nagyrabe.
Thick fog in the area has hampered the hunt. "If we find the beast, it will be taken to a zoo in Debrecen," the nearest major town, said Jozsa, adding that activists of the nearby Hortobagy National Park were continuing to search.
No panthers have been reported missing from Hungarian zoos, but officials said the animal might have escaped from private owners who had kept it illegally.
"It has become fashionable among the nouveau riche to keep some kind of big cat," said zoo director Tibor Nagy Sandor. - Sapa-AFP