Two otter pups have been born at Longleat and are being hand reared after their mother failed to produce enough milk.

Deputy head of section, Beverley Allen, took up the role of surrogate mother.

The intrepid pups have been named as Sumalee and Kasem – meaning Flower and Happiness in Thai where the Asian short-clawed otter originates.

Beverley said: "We try to maintain a hands off approach with any newborn at Longleat as nine times out of ten, mum is the best bet. Being full-time mum to two pups is pretty hard work."

Beverley is feeding them every three and a half hours with artificial milk and they are sleeping in her spare bedroom.

She said: "They are now around four weeks old and are completely helpless at the moment, entirely reliant on me to look after them.

"I'm trying not to handle them too much as ideally we'd like to introduce them back into the otter group once they've reached full weaning age at around 130 days.

"I'm sure that this won't stop me popping them into the bath at home though as from about 10 weeks we'll start introducing them to water."

The two pups were born to 11-year-old Rosie and her partner Romeo, six.

The pair were introduced to each other five years ago and it was love at first sight.

Otters pair for life and Rosie has already had successful litters at Longleat.