Little Lavender the badger cub was just a few days old when she was brought to the Scottish SPCA National Wildlife Rescue Centre on Valentine’s Day.
At that stage, she weighed just 250g – the same as a block of butter.
Staff at the centre in Alloa, Clackmannanshire said she is the ‘smallest’ cub they have ever seen.
They believe she was dragged from her set by something and was too small to get back to them.
Wildlife assistant April Sorley said she would hand-rear her.
At first she was small enough to fit in the palm of her hand, but after two weeks of being fed ‘around the clock’, she has doubled in weight.
The tiny cub still weighs less than a bag of sugar at just 575g and it will be another 12 weeks until she is weaned.
Adoptive mum April said: ‘We believe Lavender is the youngest badger cub to be cared for at our National Wildlife Rescue Centre.
‘When she arrived she was smaller than my hand and she is now just over that size.
‘I’ll be hand-rearing her until she is 12-weeks-old as that is when she be weaned if she was with her mum in the wild.’
SSPCA staff said they don’t normally see badgers at the centre until April when they are around 12 weeks old and have started to explore.
Posting pictures of Lavender online they said: ‘For the past week one member of staff has been rearing the smallest badger we think we’ve ever seen at the centre, feeding around the clock.
‘She’s just about two weeks old now and arrived at just over 250g on Valentine’s Day.
‘Very early for this wee one to be out the sett, however she was dragged from her home and her family.
‘We usually see badgers at centre around April and at 12 weeks or so of age once they’ve started wandering around and exploring.’
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