A COUPLE spent hundreds of pounds to create a spooktacular experience for trick or treaters.

Jackie Hickman and her husband, Gary, have been decking out their gruesome garden in Wivenhoe for the past eight years.

This year, they spent three days setting up their daughter’s garden just around the corner in Rosabelle Avenue, creating the biggest Halloween scene yet.

Mrs Hickman said: “We had a small garden at first which could just about fit a few gravestones in.

“Over the years we have bought more and more, thankfully my daughter let us use her garden this year.

“At first we never did it for charity but last year we did it for the foodbank and got 53kg of food for them.

“This year we did it to raise money for two cat rescues.”

This year the haunted garden included a spooky carnival, a merry-go-round with clowns, a fortune teller’s box, a graveyard with zombies and ghosts, a witch’s coven with potions and spell books, and even a mortuary with blood-splattered sheets.