FORTUNE-HUNTERS digging for buried Victorian treasure have left a North East golf club with expensive repairs after burrowing deep into the course fairway.

Officials at Tynedale Golf Club at Hexham discovered three 4ft deep holes on the sixth fairway of the riverside course.

It is believed a gang of raiders was searching for valuable bottles dumped there when the land was used as Hexham tip as far back as the 1890s.

Now the golf club, facing expensive repairs, has had enough, and plans to introduce private security patrols after a series of similar raids over several years.

Old and rare bottles can fetch large sums of money and “bottle diggers” around the country have pinpointed sites where bottles are believed to be buried.

After surveying the damage Tynedale Golf Club chairman Brendan Murphy said: “Unfortunately for us, one of those sites seems to be our sixth fairway.

“The problem is that before the golf club was built on the land and opened in 1908, this land was the tip for Hexham and lots of bottles were dumped there.

“The bottles were never removed. The course was built over the top of it and therefore these people believe the bottles are still there.