SlyCat

SlyCat, also known as Bamber Raccoon, formerly as Sylvester (born November 1, 1980 in Hampshire, England), is a furry fan who lives in Preston, Lancashire.

Fandom involvement
SlyCat discovered the furry fandom in 1997 via the Fursuit Mailing List, encountering real life furs at the 1999 London Furmeet. SlyCat started his online presence going by the name of Sylvester, a name inspired by the Looney Tunes character. He later contracted Sylvester to Sly and added on Cat to produce the name SlyCat.

Since 1999 SlyCat has attended many of the London and other meets around the country up until 2006 when he no longer felt it necessary to attend every single one. SlyCat still attends London Furmeets but rather infrequently, favoring smaller, more personal gatherings. SlyCat has also attended a number of conventions since 2002.

SlyCat was responsible for the creation of both Fursuit.co.uk (~February 2001 - July 2019), a fursuit resource page for fursuiters in the UK, and Furmeets.co.uk (24 May 2015 - 24 October 2018), a site which provided listings of all future scheduled UK furmeets happening in the UK.

SlyCat has been the registered owner of FurNet IRC channel, #UK since 1999 and was the original founder of the HantsFurs group.

Fursuiting
SlyCat purchased his first fursuit in 1999 in the form of a replica Dale Chipmunk from eBay, later sold to make room for his next fursuit, a Sylvester The Cat replica made by Atalon of Anthro Creations. This one was also subsequently sold late 2005 to Colifox in preparation for a new fursuit.

On August 23, 2006, SlyCat received his new character fursuit built by Jax The Purple Bat, based on the design by KeiHound, at the London Stansted Airport just prior to his departure for Eurofurence 12, where it made its appearance debut as a partial suit.

The final parts to complete the suit, bodysuit and feet, were received on July 3, 2007 at the Westin Hotel just in time for Anthrocon 2007 where the suit made its first American con appearance. SlyCat participated in both the fursuit parade and the fursuit photo shoot during the event.

In January 2014, SlyCat received a raccoon fursuit made by Deezburry of FluffStorm. The suit was made as a 100% artistic license by Deezburry. Going by the name Bamber Raccoon. Deezburry made the suit after having enough material leftover after making a new tail for UK fursuiter Rocky Raccoon. Therefore, the character's fictional origin is that he has been cloned from Rocky's tail and as such is his brother. Bamber made his convention debut at ConFuzzled 2014. In September 2019 it was announced that Bamber would be sold.

Conventions attendance

 * Anthrocon - 2002, 2007
 * ConFuzzled - 2009, 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014 (*), 2015 (*), 2016 (*), 2017 (*), 2018 (*), 2019 (***)
 * Eurofurence - 2006, 2008, 2010, 2012, 2014
 * Further Confusion - 2006, 2008, 2009, 2020
 * Rather Brilliant Weekend (RBW) - 2009 (**)
 * The Great Furscape - 2012, 2013
 * Midwest FurFest - 2015, 2018
 * NordicFuzzCon - 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019

(*) Staff member (**) Saturday and Boat party only (***) One day only