Yorkshire - "Ay up, sounds like a right bloody omen," the head of Harrogate Parks and Gardens moaned today as national headlines reported that 100,000 tree saplings planted as part of the Queen's Diamond Jubilee had been accidentally mown down because of a SatNav glitch.
"There'll be hell to pay for if Her majesty finds out."
Groundsmen used the internet 'instead of common sense' to decide which ancient meadow to cut in a motorized lawn mower tragedy fast resembling farce.
Scores of acres of expensive native oak, ash, beech, sycamore and rowan saplings were systematically razed to the ground, destroying months of laborious planting by volunteers.
This afternoon contractors from the Lazy Navvy Jobshare Co issued a statement regretting the incident but adding that one unexpected consolation was that it had 'enhanced the biodiversity of the species-rich meadow'.
Billions of foliage-munching arboricultural bacteria have now descended on the site and reduced it to a pungent green slime.
The Duchess of Malfi is 69.
