After four days on the run, a Japanese macaque that escaped from a Scottish zoo has been captured in a garden where it had come looking for food, the park said, AFP reports.
Honshu, whose species is also known as the snow monkey, has been tracked using drones with thermal imaging cameras since he managed to break out of his enclosure in Highland Wildlife Park, set among the mountains and forests of the Cairngorms National Park, on Sunday.
"Following a call received shortly after 10am, our keepers and team of drone pilots went to a private garden where the monkey was feeding in a feeder, and managed to capture it using a tranquilliser dart," explained Keith Gilchrist, one of the zoo's managers.
The young monkey will be examined by a veterinarian before being reunited with the other adolescent males in the group, he added.
Honshu was spotted and tracked for 45 minutes using drones, but it was safer to capture him at a time when he was not roaming freely.
The Royal Zoological Society of Scotland has assured that the male is not considered a danger to humans or domestic animals, but advised against approaching him. / BGNES
