Firefighters freed a frightened fox that had got its head stuck in a watering can in East Sheen this morning.

Ben Midgley, the Richmond Green watch manager, said crews were called to Milton Road by a concerned resident who spotted the fox cub at 8.30am.

When they arrived the distressed fox was sitting on her lap in a car, wrapped in a blanket.

Firefighters took around 15 minutes to free the animal by cutting around the opening of the can, before releasing it in a back alley.

Mr Midgley said: “The resident initially heard it banging around at about 6.30am but thought it was just builders on the opposite side of the road.

“After taking her kids to school she spotted the fox and phoned us.

“We found the fox with the resident who phoned it in, sitting in her lap in her car. She was trying to keep it calm.

“We took it out of the car because we didn’t want it in the car when we freed it because it was quite scared and we didn’t know what it would do.”

Mr Midgley said it took ‘quite a bit of doing’ to get the fox out of the watering can.

Firefighters then took it to an alley in which local foxes congregate so it would be in familiar surroundings, he said.

Once released it ran off and disappeared under a hedge.