Road kill used for kilt sporrans

Badgers are among the wild animals used by Kate Macpherson

A taxidermist is using wild animals knocked down and killed on roads to make sporrans.

Kate Macpherson, of Beauly, Inverness-shire, has collected badgers, foxes, deer and stoats from verges.

She said she only used animals that would otherwise have lain rotting by the side of a road.

However, animal welfare campaigners have criticised the product, claiming it will lead to the deaths of other animals.

Mrs Macpherson said she was inspired by the the badger skin sporran worn by her father's Army regiment.

The mother-of-three's friends and neighbours tip her off on the location of road kills.

She said: "If I didn't pick up these animals they would be rotting in a ditch.

"I'm creating something useful from them rather than allowing their beauty to be wasted."

She added: "But they're not for everybody I admit. People seem to either love them or hate them."

Mrs Macpherson, who trained in taxidermy when she was 22, has licences to handle protected animals, but has faced complaints from animal welfare groups.

One person, who saw her stand at the Scottish Game Fair in Perthshire, called the police who sent an officer to see her.

Lynda Korimboccus, head of the Scottish Animal Rights Alliance, said the use of the animals - even if they were killed on a road - was wrong.

She added: "Using a dead animal for clothing perpetuates the idea that that's what animals are for.

"That will lead to the deaths of other animals which will be killed to satisfy the market for fur."