Rosie Wang was returning to Port Douglas from Cairns at 6.30pm on January 12 when she saw ‘a large tawny brown feline shape’ illuminated in her headlights on the side of the road.

“It was almost as large as the street marker that it was next to,” she said.

“Certainly I have never seen a domestic cat that big, or indeed with light brown colouring more like a lion.”

Rosie is not the first to come forward with a big cat sighting in North Queensland. Several accounts have been reported of a similar coloured animal in the Atherton Tablelands and Ravenshoe areas, while large black cats have been seen in Upper Barron and the Daintree.

A number of puma-like sightings were also recorded in the Gympie region last year, with one man claiming to have seen a leopard at Rainbow Beach.

“I would be interested to see if other locals knew about this (animal) or had seen it,” Rosie said.

"On googling this strange sight it was interesting to read about other people's experiences."