A man from Marlow has criticised ‘mindless’ vandalism to two trees on his local High Street which appear to have been pushed over, amid a wider trend of similar incidents over recent weeks.

Dr Ewan McLeish first noticed damage to one of the pear trees on the High Street two years ago, with its newly skewed appearance lending it a “severe and unsightly” quality.

A tree officer told him the formerly “beautiful” plant “could not be straightened” following the damage.

Dr McLeish’s frustration was renewed this week, however, when he noticed the same vandals had apparently targeted another tree on the street, leaving it at even more haphazard an angle than its predecessor.

He said: “The size of the tree means that this (must have been) a group act – and as far as I know, it cannot be rectified.

“This mindless vandalism is actually worse than the damage to the other tree. It looks awful.

“It will be a permanent testimony to the stupidity and thoughtlessness of some of the people who roam Marlow’s High Street in the early hours at weekends. It will happen again.”

Dr McLeish also called for “more vigorous” police patrols to deter antisocial behaviour in the area.

Adding: “This damage is permanent and damaging, both to the tree itself and the look of the High Street.

“It is a gratuitous piece of criminal damage carried out by mindless thugs. It says everything about us as a society.”

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It comes amid what Nick Rowcliffe, who works at Releaf Marlow, a community project aiming to increase the number of trees in and around the town, described as an undeniable rise in incidents over recent weeks.

Mr Rowcliffe said other relatively young trees have been “snapped off” on Wycombe Road and Little Marlow Road in the last fortnight, and that he believed the increase was due to young people going out drinking in the warm spring weather.

“In one instance, the whole tree was broken off, which you would need more than one person to do. To push over the trees in the High Street, you’d probably need to be sitting on someone else’s shoulders.

“It is a rash of incidents at the moment. A year ago, a cherry tree on Lock Road was taken right out of the ground and thrown over a fence, and another one was broken at the same spot quite recently.”

“I know it’s happening, but I’m not going to get too grumpy about it. Our strategy is just to plant faster, so we can hopefully make up the difference.”