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PODCAST

Open Country

Countryside magazine featuring the people and wildlife that shape the landscape of the British Isles

science nature

All Episodes

24:06

Frampton Country Fair

Open Country ·

2022/10/20

The terrier racing is the highlight, "because they are so badly behaved". But before then there are the otters, plus the otterhounds, hunting from horseback with an eagle, and impressive gundog displays. The Frampton Country Fair has been running since 1986, set on the Frampton estate near the River Severn in Gloucestershire. Miles Warde speaks to everyone behind the scenes - including Rollo Clifford, Lib Smith and Sharon Sugars - and many of the exhibitors taking part. Expect a proud and defiant

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24:40

Gedling Colliery: From Pit to Park

Open Country ·

2022/10/13

Gedling Colliery, in the Nottinghamshire coalfield, closed in 1991 after nearly a hundred years of activity. At its peak, the pit produced more than a million tonnes of coal a year and thousands of local men worked there. It was known locally as 'The Pit of Nations’ because of its diverse workforce from the 1950s to the 1980s.In this programme, Rose Ferraby visits the site of the old pit tip, which has been converted into a country park. She meets a local historian and a former mine worker as well

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26:17

Beefeater Bend on the Tour de France

Open Country ·

2022/08/25

Over a decade ago, two friends from Essex decided to break off from work and drive down to the Alps. Neither knew much about cycling but the plan was to watch the Tour de France dressed in peaked caps and cravats. Probably best not to ask why. By 2014 when the race came to Yorkshire, they'd moved on to full Beefeater outfits - red jackets, black hats, white gloves, matching shades. They love dancing to europop at the side of the road, and in 2019 they were voted the Union Cycliste Internationale

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24:22

Cornwall with Helen Glover

Open Country ·

2022/08/18

Helen Glover returns to her beloved childhood patch of Newlyn and Penzance in Cornwall to explore the area where she grew up and discover how it’s changed since she was a girl. Helen is a double Olympic gold-medal winner and her love of physical activity and the outdoors was shaped by her childhood environment. She recalls running along the prom as part of her training as a schoolgirl athlete, and reflects on fond memories of her Dad’s small but legendary ice-cream business, wheeling supplies up

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24:28

Finding Balblair

Open Country ·

2022/08/11

Helen Mark is in Ullapool in the Scottish Highlands, where she discovers the "lost" village of Balblair, visits the spectacular Corrieshalloch Gorge and tours the Russian Arctic Convoy Museum. Presented by Helen MarkProduced by Kathleen Carragher

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24:11

Radical Essex

Open Country ·

2022/08/04

Emily Knight uncovers an unexpectedly radical story, hidden in the Essex countryside. In the 1940s, men and women horrified by the violence of war, disconnected, disillusioned and despondent, began to turn to the land - and each other - for healing. A new way of life was needed, and a new movement sprang up. Part pacifist philosophy, part radical Christianity, part utopian idealism, the Back-to-the-Land movement of the '40s and '50s saw groups of people coming together to take over pockets of

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23:57

A new road for Kerrera

Open Country ·

2022/07/28

It's so close to the mainland that most people don't even realise it is there, but Kerrera in early summer is a jewel, and Antonia Quirke - who lives a couple of miles away - is curious about the impact of a new road. Early one summer morning she and producer Miles Warde take the ferry from Oban to find out what has changed.Antonia Quirke is a broadcaster and author. She moved to the west coast of Scotland at the start of lockdown for love.Produced for BBC audio in Bristol by Miles Warde

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24:47

Uncharted Stories of the Causeway Coast

Open Country ·

2022/07/27

Helen Mark is in Northern Ireland to hear little known histories about the Causeway Coast. A new project is gathering stories from the local community to add to a digital map, before they are forgotten forever.Produced by Beatrice Fenton.

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24:37

Aberystwyth Inspiration

Open Country ·

2022/07/15

Writer Niellah Arboine returns to her university town of Aberystwyth, to remember the landscape which inspired her writing so much. She recalls how shocking it was to arrive in a place so different from her South London home. Niellah meets three other creatives working in Cardigan Bay, and explores their connections with place, art and the natural world. Produced by Beatrice Fenton

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24:20

The Search for Summer Snow

Open Country ·

2022/07/11

Andrew Cotter and Iain Cameron first met on twitter, though neither will admit who made the first move. They've been walking together since 2016 and are often looking for snow. Iain researches snow patches across the Highlands and Andrew seems to enjoy coming along for the ride. On a marvellous early sunlit morning they climb the Grey Corries with producer Miles Warde and try to work out how much snow will survive the summer heat. Iain Cameron is the author of The Vanishing Ice. He's been drawn to

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24:05

The Book, the Fish and the Dove

Open Country ·

2022/06/30

It's fast approaching 400 years since The Compleat Angler, arguably the most famous fishing manual ever to have been written, was first published. Often referred to as the “bible” of the angler, it has sold more copies than the St John’s Bible and only been out of print once. Its author, Sir Izaak Walton, was a fisherman, writer and philosopher. Open Country celebrates the life, writing and legacy of Walton by visiting the cottage in Shallowford which he bought and is now a museum, and joining a

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24:23

Cornwall’s Steam Heritage

Open Country ·

2022/06/23

Ian Marchant finds the streets of Camborne alive and hissing with the sound of steam traction engines. It’s Trevithick Day, commemorating Richard Trevithick, the inventor of the first steam-powered vehicle. As Ian finds out, the invention was a step towards the mechanisation of farming and road building, as well as the development of railways. Ian visits the preserved East Pool Tin Mine and hears how Trevithick’s innovation in high pressure steam-pumping engines contributed to the 19th century

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24:17

Erland Cooper's Orkney

Open Country ·

2022/06/16

Composer Erland Cooper takes us on a tour of his Orkney homeland - with help from artists, poets, some Neolithic monuments and around a million swirling sea-birds.Producer for BBC Audio in Bristol : Emily Knight

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24:27

Bath Workhouse Burial Ground

Open Country ·

2022/04/28

Helen Mark visits a field on the edge of Bath, once used as the burial ground for Bath Union Workhouse. Over 3100 bodies of people who died in poverty between 1858 and 1899 were buried here in unmarked graves. For over a hundred years, the site has been unrecognised and those buried here forgotten. Now a group of local residents, artists, and descendants of those buried here are remembering what happened. Helen hears how the group is planting trees and wildflowers, putting up a plaque, and

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24:20

The Wash

Open Country ·

2022/04/26

Helen Mark visits the Wash, a vast bay in East Anglia, where the interests of fishing and conservation are finely balanced. The Wash has been fished for centuries for cockles, mussels and brown shrimp, but it's also visited by thousands of migratory birds, as they crisscross the globe. Fishing in the bay has been sustainably managed for the last 30 years, but next year things are changing, causing uncertainty and concern for the Wash fishing fleet.Produced by Beatrice Fenton.

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24:33

Mammoth Hunting on the Norfolk Coast

Open Country ·

2022/04/14

This week's Open Country is a journey along a stretch of familiar coastline, but also back in time, to a far less familiar landscape. Emily Knight explores the Deep History Coast of North Norfolk, where the crumbling shoreline has given up some of the most impressive fossil remains ever discovered. To help her get a sense of the landscape that came before this one, she meets palaeontologist and author of "Otherlands", Dr Thomas Halliday, who explains what this ancient place would have looked like,

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24:24

Husky Sledding in the Cairngorms

Open Country ·

2022/04/07

Helen Mark travels to the rolling hills of Aberdeenshire, home of the Cairngorms National Park. Popular with walkers, hikers, nature-lovers and 'munro-baggers' alike, these hills are undoubtedly a beautiful place to visit. But you can ditch your hiking boots for this episode of Open Country, because Helen's exploring in a different way: from the back of a husky-pulled sled!At the reins is Wattie McDonald, husky-lover, musher, and a veteran of the extraordinary 'Iditarod': the gruelling thousand-mile

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25:02

California's Giant Cousins

Open Country ·

2022/01/29

Not far from Offa's Dyke in mid-Wales there stands a grove of Coast Redwoods - the oldest and largest of its kind in Europe. Brought over from their native California in the 1850s, the trees - which are still in their infancy - tower above others nearby. The author Tracy Chevalier ('Girl with a Pearl Earring') visited these woods with her husband, plant writer Jonathan Drori, 30 years ago. In her 2016 novel, 'At the Edge of the Orchard' she tells the story of how the trees were collected and brought

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24:43

Goats on the Gun Batteries

Open Country ·

2022/01/20

Purdown is a large green hilly area on the edge of Bristol and is one of the highest points of the city. It's marked out by two buildings: the telecom tower and the large yellow dower house - a familiar sight to anyone who regularly drives along the nearby M32. In this programme Helen Mark explores the area, finding out about its significance in World War II, and meeting the goats which are now helping to preserve the remains of the gun placements put there to protect the city from bombing raids

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24:35

Ancient Dartmoor

Open Country ·

2022/01/13

Dartmoor is one of the UK's most significant archaeological landscapes. In this episode of Open Country, Ian Marchant explores some of its most interesting sites. He meets the National Park's lead archaeologist and finds out about a new research project being carried out by an academic from Leicester University, who is using cutting-edge new technology to discover structures which may have been left by Dartmoor’s earliest farming communities more than five thousand years ago. Ian also meets a

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334 results

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