Laughing gas canisters are being strewn around towns and even nature reserves as users get their highs and then leave a mess.

Now rowdy students are being blamed for dumping hundreds of the canisters on the street following a series of all-night parties.

And in another part of Kent, abusers of the legal high have been leaving the containers strewn around a nature reserve.

These pictures show a supermarket trolley abandoned in a residential road with the contents spilling onto a neighbour’s property.

The silver canisters are thought to be empty cartridges used for inhaling nitrous oxide – a legal high known as ‘hippy crack’.

The city council and police are investigating complaints about the party and the ‘drug paraphernalia’ strewn across Pretoria Road in Canterbury.

Furious residents point the finger at students from Christ Church University.

David McLanaghan, 70, who lives nearby, says: “They’re out the front at night inhaling from these balloons, smoking, screaming and giggling. It seems to be several times a week.

“It can go on for hours – until 5am. I’m suffering with an aggressive form of cancer. If I could just sleep at night I could fight it better.”

Mr McLanaghan, who lives with wife Christine, moved into the property in 1979, but says he is now desperate to sell.

“This used to be a residential road with 40 houses, 40 families and 49 gardens,” he said.

“Now there’re eight families left, and they want to leave.

“We’re being driven out.”

The most recent incident took place on Tuesday night, with Mr McLanaghan reporting hearing and seeing screeching youngsters inhaling from balloons into the early hours.

Neighbours woke recently to find scores of the small silver canisters simply discarded outside their homes.

Weeks earlier, residents found a supermarket trolley which had been pushed out into the road, laden with the canisters.

It had tipped, again spilling the contents into the road.

One resident, who asked not to be named, said: “Their lives are in our living room. We can’t go out for a glass of wine in the garden. The gardens are used for parties. We have to go to bed with the windows shut in the hope of getting a little sleep.

“That’s what it’s like living next to students. Most of us are thinking about moving, to be honest.”

Mr McLanaghan says the problem is city-wide.

“It’s not just here, it doesn’t seem to matter which residential neighbourhood you’re in – there are students,” he said.

“Of course, the majority will be sickened by the behaviour of the few too – they’re not all party animals. But you need the landlords, the council and the universities to take more responsibility. There needs to be a marriage between students and residents.”

A spokesman for Canterbury Christ Church University said: “The university takes its role and responsibility as part of the local community very seriously.

“We aim to listen to local residents and students to prevent and manage situations of this kind, and we have been in touch with Mr McLanaghan today, to understand more about his concerns and to offer support where we can.

“We have recommended to Mr McLanaghan that he contact Canterbury City Council who, alongside letting agencies and/ or landlords, investigate and address issues of anti-social behaviour within private residencies.”

Meanwhile, in Sittingbourne, a woman has spoken of her disgust at finding canisters of so-called hippy crack at a nature reserve.

“It’s not nice to be going over there and finding stuff like that" - Claire Robinson

Claire Robinson was walking her labrador, Bella, in the Meads Community Woodland near her home in Sonora Fields when she found the area around a picnic bench littered with the legal high containers, as well as discarded alcohol bottles and cannabis paraphernalia.

Although designed to be used to make whipped cream, the canisters are bought by people to be used as a drug for as little as 50p.

Despite being legal in the UK, nitrous oxide has been associated with around 17 deaths since 2006.

Mrs Robinson, 46, who regularly uses the picturesque area, said: “It is my second garden – it’s a lovely space.

Other laughing gas abuses

Hippy crack found close to primary school

Firefighters called after youths seen throwing canisters onto fire

“It’s not nice to be going over there and finding stuff like that.”

Despite immediately clearing up the canisters and properly disposing of them, the following day she discovered more.

She added: “It’s safety, too. Is some poor kid going to die from that stuff?”