Yes, that fine - and great shots too!

It seems that it is a historic colliery spoil tip location but was also used for other waste, both legally and illegally. Details here (PDF)

These results are from the Environment Agency testing in England only. Testing in Wales is carried out by Natural Resources Wales (NRW) - and by DEARA in NI and by SEPA in Scotland. I don’t think that they all publish their results at the same time though.

That’s a female stag beetle. There is some info on them here.

They are very impressive.

I’m on holiday for a fortnight now. Away with a group of friends at a chalet that one of them owns. Im overlooking the bay, the sea is beautiful and the weather is fine.

Im quite a bit over 30 - late 50s - and we have been doing this for just over half my life now.

This time, however, one of the friends isn’t here, since he is getting more and more reluctant to leave his house at all and has been since covid. Another isn’t here because he has just been in for an operation to remove a melanoma.

The effects of aging are definitely being quite prominent at the moment.

Yes - it is included in the caption for the photo on the Beeb’s page: Mael Dumcail - a single line for the A and then four for the E.

And here’s the official website for National Hedgerow Week - including some free online talks.

The top image is the video - but it seems that quite a few adblockers block access.

The previous one included ROI - as you can see here.

River pollution is not only from sewage of course - a lot is from farming, and that is probably just as likely in ROI as in the UK.

The Wildlife Trusts have some info on them (just as a variation on the usual wiki link).

Oh yes, very much - and not just with movies, but TV, novels, stage performance and the like.

As a kid, it was just the overall visuals and spectacle as much as anything - details of the plot were secondary. Into my teens and early twenties and think that plot details came to dominate and after that exploring interesting concepts began to take priority. Then I guess that I began to appreciate the production side of things more: writing quality and cinematography etc maybe into my 30s and 40s. And these days (in my 50s) I am much more focused on character-driven things.

My first computer was a ZX81 - in 1982 - which, with my brother, I built from a kit and was astonished when it actually worked. We eventually added the 16k ram pack too: how could anyone possibly use all that?!

First phone. I think it was a Nokia 5110 or similar in 2000.

Fairly standard (for the UK, in the '70s): black trousers, blue or white shirt, dark blue blazer, school tie etc.

BUT, the blazer had the school emblem on, which was derived from the poultry trade that had been a major feature of the town’s prosperity at one time: we all had a large un-ironic turkey embroidered on our chests.

Gödel, Escher, Bach: an Eternal Golden Braid by Douglas Hofstadter.

And here is an article on them.

Lucas has said that we wanted it to appeal to 12 year olds - and I was.

Star Wars (A New Hope) - Lucas had a particular age of audience in mind. I was that age when it was released, and he hit the target.

That implies that the others have got complete maps - which I find much more surprising. Every time that I have had any dealings with any utility companies - which I do as part of my job - it becomes apparent very early on that they don’t have anything like accurate maps in whatever area I am looking at. And not just for old lines that they inherited - as seems to be the issue here - but for things like fibre optics that I saw them lay myself just 18 months earlier.

I’m off to Cornwall in a few weeks. Pretty much every year I go there with friends - we stay for a fortnight in a chalet that one of them has.

I hope that my SO and I will be able to get another week or so in in September. It’ll also be in the UK - maybe Yorkshire this time.

We might spend a few days camping somewhere too - maybe north Norfolk.

Thar would depend on what is in it. It seems that the dumping was a commercial operation of some kind, and the big money in waste handling is around hazardous waste. If there is hazardous waste in there it could include all kinds of highly toxic chemicals that will leach into the waterways and may include herbicides that will kill any vegetation that attempts to grow there.

And you can’t tell that without checking through it all.

All that is leaving aside the SSSI designation and protected species that are already there and that would prevent anyone from legally ‘flating it’.