Animal welfare charities say a fox has been killed by a pack of hounds at a Scottish hunt.

The incident is said to have happened on November 5 at the the Lanarkshire and Renfrewshire Hunt in Harelaw, near Bridge of Weir.

Charities OneKind and the League Against Cruel Sports say the animal had been through unnecessary suffering.

The fox's body was autopsied by vetinary services firm SAC Consulting, which found: "The fox had suffered severe trauma consistent with that caused by a dog or dogs."

The Countryside Alliance and the hunt's organisers have strongly refuted the claims and say the fox was legally shot.

A ban on hunting with dogs was imposed in Scotland in 2002 after campaigners argued that the practice is unnecessary and brings about long-lasting psychological trauma for animals.

The law states that dogs can be used in certain circumstances - in order to bring foxes from below ground and out into the open, a practice known as 'flushing to guns'.

However campaigners believe that at least half of Scotland's registered hunts continue to flout the 2002 ban.

OneKind say the autopsy is the first to be carried out on a fox killed by a hunt since before the ban came into force.

The charity's director Harry Huyton said: "Despite a law which supposedly prevents foxes from suffering negative welfare impacts from hunting with hounds, this unprecedented post-mortem of a hunted fox makes it clear that suffering continues.

"The level of trauma experienced by the fox prior to its death and the manner in which it died is completely unacceptable and debunks the myth that foxes killed by packs of hounds are dispatched with a 'quick nip to the back of the neck'.

"The pathology report highlights a catalogue of gruesome injuries leaving no doubt to the extent to which this animal suffered."

The report found the animal had extensive tearing of the skin and had a hole in its chest wall.

It found that the fox had been shot with a shotgun but the pellets had missed its vital organs.

Robbie Marshall, of the League Against Cruel Sports, said: "We look forward to the Scottish Government strengthening the law to make sure that no other foxes are killed in this dreadful and repugnant way.

"The law was intended to put an end to the cruelty of hunting foxes with hounds but it isn't worth the paper it's written on if wild animals are continuing to suffer in this manner."

A spokesman for the Countryside Alliance said: "In compliance with the law the fox in question had been shot on being flushed from cover by the hounds.

"The Lanarkshire and Renfrewshire Foxhounds have an open and ongoing relationship with Police Scotland, one that includes the notification of their activities in advance of hunting days and a facility for direct contact with Police Scotland throughout.

"It is clear that the Lanarkshire & Renfrewshire were acting both legally and responsibly in the control of foxes.

"Wild and unsubstantiated claims from animal rights organisations about suffering are both predictable and ridiculous."

Mark Crichton Maitland, the chairman of the Lanarkshire and Renfrewshire Fox Hounds, said the claims were a "stunt" ahead of the publication of a review into the law around fox hunting.

He said: "We certainly don't recognise that description of the incident and neither have they released the pathology report."

He continued: "As far as what happened on the day, the fox was shot pretty cleanly, death was pretty instantaneous.

"I spoke to my senior master who was out that day, and he said the time between the gun going off and the fox being dead was about 10 seconds."

Mr Crichton Maitland also said the hunt operated within the law, saying: "We work with the police, we always work within the law."