A long way from home! Muddy the seal pup is found in Plymouth after straying 3,000 miles off course from the Arctic

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A plucky seal pup usually found in the Arctic Circle has been recorded in the English Channel for the first time after straying 3,000 miles (4,800km) off course.

The young mammal was at first mistaken for a native common seal when it was rescued from mudflats near Plymouth, Devon.  

But a closer examination has confirmed it to be a female ringed seal - a species which rarely ventures south of Norway.

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A plucky seal pup usually found in the Arctic Circle has been recorded in the English Channel for the first time after straying 3,000 miles off course

The animal, nicknamed Muddy, is one of only 12 ringed seals ever recorded in the UK over the last 200 years, with the majority of these being found in Scottish waters.

The previous most southerly record was in 1828 when one was recovered in the Severn Estuary near Bristol.

Staff at the Cornish Seal Sanctuary in Gweek were stunned when they identified Muddy as a ringed seal with the help of experts at the Polar Institute in Tromso, Norway.

The pup is only nine months old and was incredibly lucky to survive the journey south through busy shipping lanes and warmer waters.

She was malnourished and had wounds on her tail, flippers and jaw.

She is now recovering at the sanctuary where staff are still deciding what to do with her.

Animal care team leader, Tamara Cooper, said: 'She must have swum through some very busy shipping lanes to get to where she was, and it's a wonder she wasn't in worse shape.

The pup is only nine months old and was incredibly lucky to survive the journey south through busy shipping lanes and warmer waters. She was malnourished and had wounds on its tail, flippers and jaw

'Muddy has responded well to treatment and we are hopeful that she will make a full recovery.

'Her long-term future remains to be decided. A return to the Arctic may not be the answer, as other seals sent back there after washing up on European shores have just come straight back south again.

'That's what happened with an Arctic hooded seal we released off the far north of Scotland in 2007.

'He was fitted with a satellite tracker, so we could follow his journey but he only swam a little way north, then did a u-turn and headed all the way down to southern Spain.'

Ringed seals get their name from the light-colored circular patterns that appear on their darker grey backs

The ringed seal was found in the English Channel for the first time after straying 3,000 miles (4,800km) off course

Ringed seals generally live in the Arctic Ocean, where the sea temperature is about -2°C, and are the primary prey of polar bears.

They grow to around 4.5ft (1.37 metres) long and can live to about 30 years.

They are rarely found in open sea but have been known to travel south through the North Atlantic as far as Greenland and Scandinavia.

Muddy has been placed in the sanctuary's grey seal rehabilitation pool, which she has to herself.

Muddy has been placed in the sanctuary's grey seal rehabilitation pool, which she has to herself