FARMER Alan Hutchings is blaming youngsters for a blaze which destroyed a barn and £1,000 of hay, and badly damaged the doors and roof of an adjoining stable and shed.

Fire crews took five hours to put out the blaze at the barn, at the rear of Beversbrook Lane, Calne, on Sunday.

Neighbours raised the alarm at 3.45pm, and later told Mr Hutchings, 59, of Curricomb Farm, Tytherton Lucas, they saw children running away from the building.

The two-storey barn, with a corrugated iron roof and concrete walls, was destroyed. The roof of a shed next door was also damaged, as were the doors of a stable the other side.

Seven tons of hay and three tons of straw were destroyed in the fire.

Mr Hutchings had planned to keep his two horses there, and the stable had been prepared ready for their arrival.

He said be believes it was a revenge attack by teenagers after he told their mates off for playing in the barn.

He said: "I am fuming really, but there is nothing I can do about keeping children off my property."

Mr Hutchings found out about the blaze when he returned from horse racing at Barbury Castle with wife Brenda at 6.30pm.

He said he caught a group of three teenagers, about 13 years old, in the barn last Thursday.

"We have had a lot of trouble with children playing about in the barn, and I have been called by my neighbours on three or four occasions," he said.

"I told them off, and I think they've come back, and this is revenge."

He said there was nothing he could do when he arrived on Sunday.

"When I got there it was all over bar the shouting, and there was little more I could do."

He and his wife Brenda

are moving to a new home in Castlefields, Calne. Curricomb Farm, which covers 123 acres, is being sold by Wiltshire County Council.

Mr Hutchings said he would have to find somewhere else to stable the horses. "How can we leave them there, when we don't know what will happen to them?"

He said he was not insured for the damage. The barn had been disused for some time, and he would not be rebuilding it.

Mrs Hutchings said she was worried that a teenager or child could seriously injure themselves playing in farm buildings.

"They could hurt themselves, and they don't realise the cost of the damage they are causing," she said.

Leading Firefighter Tom Burns, of Calne Fire Station, said the barn was well alight when crews arrived just before 4pm on Sunday.

"It was going well with loads of flames and smoke," he said. "It took a couple of hours to get the blaze under control."

He said he believes that youngsters could be responsible for starting the fire.

As the barn is set well back from the road, firefighters had to use several lines of hoses to be run to the heart of the fire. A crew from Chippenham fire station were also called to assist. The Calne crew finally left the site at about 9.30pm.

dvaller@newswilts.co.uk