A project set up to boost Scotland’s rare population of medicinal leeches has got its first babies.

Twenty have hatched in a captive-breeding programme at the Highland Wildlife Park at Kincraig, near Aviemore.

They are the offspring of leeches collected in Dumfries and Galloway, one of the few places in Scotland where the creatures are known to survive in the wild.

The leeches were once widespread but declined in numbers in the 18th and 19th centuries due to their use in medicine and loss of wetland habitats.