They may be more used to coming to the aid of clumsy cats stuck in trees - but today, firefighters were called upon for a slightly different kind of rescue.

A fire crew were this afternoon despatched to a rather unusual task, when they were called upon to rush up a tree and save a stranded seagull.

The hapless bird had managed to get itself stuck in a tree in Yarmouth Way, in Great Yarmouth, with a member of the public dialling 999 at around 12.30pm to help recover it.

A crew was sent all the way from Sprowston fire station, near Norwich, to the gull's aid, assisting the RSPCA in the rescue.

Firefighters used a ladder to clamber up the tree and free the bird from its stranded predicament.

It comes almost exactly two months to the day after another seagull had to be rescued by firefighters in Great Yarmouth town centre.

On September 18, firefighters were called at 8.30am, after a bird, which had suffered a damaged wing, got stuck on a lamp post on Regent Road.