ATV enthusiasts in Guysborough County say law enforcement officers were so heavy-handed at a recent rally, they may cancel the annual fundraiser.

Organizers of the Roy Feltmate Memorial ATV Rally in Goshen say 500 people showed up for the September event.

It's a fun time for families, says organizer Brian Mason, and one that has raised $80,000 for charities over the past 15 years.

But unlike previous years when a couple of RCMP officers watched, Mason says the RCMP and Department of Natural Resources were out in full force.

"I come to that checkpoint where they all were, well, I pretty near threw up. Natural Resources [were] there with their big bulletproof vests on, guns hanging off them," he told CBC News.

Mason says the RCMP and Natural Resources officers set up a checkpoint on private land without permission, interfered with the pace of the event, and chased a runaway ATV rider the wrong way down a trail.

In 14 years, there has never been a problem, said Mason. "They come and it's a disaster."

Mason says he was so frustrated, the next morning he burned flyers and signs associated with the event and vowed never to organize another rally.

The off-highway vehicle unit was created about a year ago after the provincial government introduced new regulations governing the machines in Nova Scotia.

It now has 12 members stationed around the province.

It's a new era of enforcement that ATV riders will have to get used to, says Brian Mailman, a member of the enforcement unit in Guysborough.

"They've been left to roam fairly freely, unchecked over a good many years, but now it's coming to a point where people are starting to understand that you can't do that anymore," he said.

Mailman says by checking on helmets and registration and that riders were not impaired, the officers were just doing their jobs.

Twenty-six people were charged with failing to have the proper registration and three with illegal possession of alcohol.