Mysterious 'dead wallaby' spotted on M5 motorway

Highways England tells The Independent it is investigating

The body of what appears to be dead wallaby has been filmed on the hard shoulder of the M5 motorway near Worcester.

Sarah Tunney said she had gone to investigate with her brother, after reading about reported sightings of the road kill on Facebook.

After spotting and filming the creature just before the turn-off at Junction 5, they speculated that it might have been a dead kangaroo, although its size meant it was more likely a smaller wallaby.

Reports of a dead marsupial first emerged on social media over the weekend.

“We thought the comments on the page were a joke until other people started commenting saying they had seen the kangaroo too,” Ms Tunney said.

Another anonymous user wrote on a local Facebook page that they "saw a kangaroo dead on the side of the motorway" just before they left the motorway at Droitwich.

“As I approached it I thought it must be a deer, but as I got closer I saw the long tail," they said. “Hopefully someone can remove it as it doesn’t deserve to be on the side of motorway."

Others suggested the animal just have been a dead deer. “Are you sure it wasn’t a monk jack as I saw a dead one there yesterday,” one Facebook user commented.

It is thought they may have been referring to a Muntjac deer, a small, stocky, brown creature which are known to live the in the region.

Highways England told The Independent it was investigating.

Though rare, small wallaby populations are believed to exist in pockets of the English countryside.

According to the Scientific American magazine, a Tasmanian subspecies called Bennet’s wallaby has been introduced to the Channel Islands, the Weald in southeast England, northern England and Scotland.

The biggest colony lives within the grounds of Whipsnade Zoo in Bedfordshire, around 80 miles southeast of where the dead creature was spotted.