GOLF club chiefs are suing an Inverclyde landowner after their course was churned up by around a dozen escaped horses.

The equine hoofing on the fairways and greens of Port Glasgow – which lasted at least six hours – caused an estimated £36,000 worth of damage.

Now the proprietor of a field where the animals were kept is facing a legal battle after witnesses declared that fencing – which should have kept them penned in – was ‘non-existent’.

The revelations emerged during the trial of Kilmacolm farmer William Baxter, who was cleared of a charge of maliciously driving his tractor through the fence at speed.

Golf club secretary Gordon Foster told Greenock Sheriff Court how he was alerted to the fact that 11 horses were on the course on October 20 2014.

Mr Foster said: “I got a call from the head greenkeeper at 8am.

“We had to phone the police and we tried our best to gather up the horses.

“It took us all day, until about two o’clock in the afternoon.”

Mr Foster, three greenkeepers and a neighbouring farmer were involved in the emergency corralling operation.

The club secretary said: “We got some buckets of food and the horses started to follow us down the third fairway.

“They had been on the third fairway, the fifth fairway and also behind the fifth tee.

“We were also trying to keep them off of the 14th green.”

The court heard that there had been an almost identical incident of horses encroaching onto the golf course in November 2013.

Club bosses were forced to reduce the size of the course from 18 holes to 12 holes and they also suffered a dip in membership numbers in the wake of that episode, it was stated.

The court heard that the land on which the horses were being kept - at High Auchenleck Farm in Port Glasgow - is owned by a Mark Graham.

Farmer William Baxter, of nearby Gryffeside Farm, Kilmacolm, had been accused of ramming the fencing with his tractor sometime between October 1 and 29 2014.

But a succession of defence witnesses told how the barrier was never fit to keep the animals confined within the field.

The golf club’s head greenkeeper of 26 years standing, James McCurdy, said: “The fence that was meant to contain the horses was non-existent.”

Port woman Caroline Turner - who had kept two horses on Mr Graham’s land between December 2013 and April 2014 – said: “The fencing just wasn’t secure.

“I was getting phone calls through the night to go and get horses.”

Miss Turner told how she had been in contact with one of two women who lease the field from Mr Graham, adding: “I was like, ‘How can you lose 11 horses?’.

Sheriff Craig Turnbull found Mr Baxter not guilty following a two-day trial.

The lawman said: “It is not necessary for me to go into all of the evidence.

“I am not satisfied who the relevant part of the fence belongs to, or where this happened - if it happened at all.”

Mr Baxter said afterwards: “It is a big relief that this is over.

“A person can make an allegation and it costs them nothing, but this has cost me huge sums of money to defend myself.”

It is understood that a hearing into Port Glasgow Golf Club’s claim against Mr Graham is scheduled to take place in May.