A dazed and confused pine marten has been rescued from a busy road by a caring vehicle recovery driver.
Donald Bowness, 28, owner of TDC Motorcare, based in Ardrishaig, Argyll, came across the animal on his way to a job at Tarbert, Loch Fyne.
He was concerned to see the pine marten running along the busy A83 Tarbet to Campbeltown road at Meall Mhor, near Tarbert, last Saturday.
Mr Bowness said: “I saw it just running along the bridge on the road about midday.
“It was a bit odd, I was worried about it getting hit by a car, so I pulled into a lay-by and ran back to chase it away from the danger. It just stopped and looked at me.
“Usually they are pretty savage so I put my foot out to see if it would attack my boot but it didn’t. I touched it on the back and it pushed its head onto my hand, so I picked it up.
“It was almost like it was someone’s pet. It just sat in my arms like a cat.
“I thought with it being like that, there was definitely something wrong. It seemed a but dazed and confused.
“I put it in the back of the van and took it with me. I didn’t want it getting run down.
“I had an apple core so I gave it that and it started eating it no bother.”
Mr Bowness took the animal home and phoned the Scottish Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (SSPCA).
He said: “It must have been tired because when I fed it some cat food it fell asleep on the kitchen floor.
“The next day the SSPCA took it away to a rehabilitation centre. They said that once it was fit and strong enough it would go back into the wild.”
Senior SSPCA Inspector in Argyll, John McAvoy, said that normally anyone picking up a pine marten would end up with a sore finger.
He said: “They are part of the same family as weasels and otters and generally not very easy to handle. It may have had some kind of injury. I suspect there was some reason why it was acting that way.
“They can be very wild, and sometimes they can be furious. They are a fully protected species, the same as the otter.”