LANCASHIRE Wildlife Trust has denied any feud with a Bolton conservation group after it was accused of sabotaging an event.

Bolton North East Wildlife Trust (NEWT) organised a day collecting seeds from yellow rattle – a plant used in the creation of wild flower meadows - at Seven Acres Country Park, in Breightmet.

The group put up fliers advertising the event but found they kept disappearing.

Chris Banks, chairman of Bolton NEWT said: “We have been putting fliers up for quite a while and they have been vandalised. When kids do it, you find them ripped up on the ground, but these ones at Seven Acres just kept disappearing.So I put a camera up to find out what was going on. To say I was surprised when I saw the footage is an understatement.Not only did they rip them down, but you can hear people cheering as they did it.”

Mr Banks believes a falling out he had with the trust while working on a placement is behind the alleged ‘sabotage. “I have a dispute with them, but I don’t go around sabotaging their things,” he added.

But Alan Wright, of Lancashire Wildlife Trust put the episode was down to a breakdown in communication.

He said: “Those posters went up and unfortunately NEWT haven’t had a chat with us. It was originally in their plan, but as the months go on things change. The point our guys are making is that if people started planting yellow rattle in an areas where it is already prevalent it would get rid of other plants in the area.

“They took the posters down hoping NEWT would contact them to have a conversation. They could have done it in Doffcocker or other sites, we already had something lined up.

Unfortunately Mr Banks put everything on Facebook, he seems to think there’s some sort of feud with us, but it’s coming completely from his side. We are in no dispute with him other than one or two things he has done recently,which we are taking advice on.”