Schoolchildren who were sick are believed to have been copying a church minister who ate a daffodil during a talk at morning assembly.

Today the Reverend Dave Bishop said he would not give the talk to youngsters at the school again.

Despite warning the children, aged eight to ten, not to eat the flowers, it is believed they copied the minister during a break.

A group of 16 children were taken to hospital after teachers found one vomiting.

The minister from Sidley Baptist Church had given a talk to pupils at St Peter and St Paul Church of England School, Bexhill, and had eaten daffodil petals in front of pupils and teachers.

But today he said most of the children went to hospital with a stomach bug unrelated to the flowers and he did not believe the children had confessed to eating the blooms.

He added: "The school has suffered a terrible stomach bug recently and one of the teachers was saying she had 11 pupils off with it. I think linking it to the daffodils incident is blowing it out of proportion.

"I have written a letter explaining my actions after calling the Press office at the Baptist Union for advice about what I should do. The letter has gone to parents.

"I have done this teaching seven or eight times at different schools in West and East Sussex and Hampshire. I tell the kids they will find it hard to believe what they are about to see. It is about seeing is believing.

"When I say I am eating them for my breakfast they all shout, 'Ugh,' and I say, 'This is not for you, this is for me'.

"I think the school did the right thing in having the kids checked out. They were monitored for two hours, which must have been noisy!

"I always use dramatic illustrations when I do these things. I will not be doing this part of it again at the school. It has had no side effects before."

But Ron Cummings, headteacher at the school, which has 432 pupils, said: "Sixteen pupils at the school were taken to hospital as a precaution after they had eaten daffodils in the school grounds.

"The incident occurred following an assembly where a visiting church minister gave a talk about Christianity. Part of his speech was about seeing is believing where he ate the petals of a daffodil but told children not to copy what he had done.

"However one child became sick and told a member of staff he had eaten daffodils and we immediately called the health authority who advised us to take the pupils to hospital."

Parents were called at 2.30pm on Tuesday and told their children had been taken to the Conquest Hospital in Hastings.

All were sent home without being given medication although one received treatment for a minor rash.

The mother of one nine-year-old boy involved said: "I had a call just after lunch. They said I should not worry because my boy had been taken to hospital. When they told me why I thought they were joking.

"I do not blame the school. He was daft for doing it and I gave him an earful when he got home."

A spokeswoman for NHS Direct said anyone who suspects their child has eaten daffodils should go to hospital immediately. She said: "The whole plant, particularly the bulb, contains alkaloids, which is basically a poisonous substance.

"If they are ingested, their symptoms include dizziness, upset stomachs, vomiting and diarrhoea.

"People need to go to the hospital fast because GPs are restricted in the blood tests they can carry out whereas hospitals are not. You should not hang about."