Litter louts have been condemned after dumping large amounts of rubbish in the much-loved Sherwood Pines Forest Park.
Operated by Forestry England, Sherwood Pines is the largest forest open to the public in the East Midlands and is typically a top attraction for families.
However, Forestry England has on numerous occasions pleaded to the public to avoid travelling to the forest from afar, with limited teams on the ground to take care of the environment amid the pandemic.
Despite this, some visitors have been dumping vast amounts of litter - including bottles, bags and food wrappers - across the 3,300-acre forest.
Forestry England described the littering as "unacceptable behaviour".
It said: "Despite making it clear that most of our facilities remain closed and with limited teams on the ground to care for and maintain the forest centres, we are still seeing increasing visitor numbers daily.
"Sadly we have to report that some people, have also been using our woodlands to dispose of their litter.
"Clearly this is unacceptable behaviour and we are appealing to everyone to please respect and protect our forests by taking your litter home during these challenging times."
The car parks in the area had been closed since the beginning of lockdown on March 23, but on Wednesday, May 13, some of them were reopened.
Forestry England said it had been preparing sites for visitors to return by cleaning, adding social distancing guidance, checking the accessibility, dismantling illegal mountain bike trails and looking out for wildlife that may have moved.
Hundreds of people took to social media to express their disgust at the amount of rubbish left.
One Facebook user said: "We also came at the weekend and the rubbish at the jumps was out of control, it had clearly been left there during lockdown, not since the forest reopened.
"I even tried to bag some up with an empty bag sat next to the bin but one bag didn't go very far.
"Even thought the rubbish wasn't ours, we said if we’d have known we’d have come with bin bags to help clear it."
Another user added: "I was on the red route on Monday and [I was] appalled at the amount of rubbish left.
"It makes me so cross that some people have no respect whatsoever."
