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Sable Island - A Dune Adrift

SABLE ISLAND - A DUNE ADRIFT (320kbs-m4a/64mb/28mins)
BBC Radio 4 Extra broadcast: 13th November 2021

100 miles east of Nova Scotia lies a 30 mile-long sand dune: Sable Island, population, two, who work in the weather and research station - and 300 wild horses.

Sean Street reveals how this remote place, this dune adrift in the Atlantic, is providing information vital to us all, and has gained a powerful presence in the imagination.

In the middle of the world's worst weather systems, held tentatively in place by ocean currents, it's the perfect place to monitor climate change, and air and sea pollution.

More than 500 ships have been wrecked here. There have been several attempts at colonisation, by the Portuguese, the French (Sable is the French word for Sand) and even a group of prominent Bostonians, and all have failed.

Thomas Raddell, Nova Scotia's finest writer, was a radio operator on Sable for a year, and this inspired his novel The Nymph and the Lamp. Poet Elizabeth Bishop visited and wrote about the island.

Sean examines wreckage from some of over 500 ships that came to grief here. There is a poignant baby's crib made from wreck wood. He meets artist Roger Savage who battled to capture the landscape. And he meets a man who dedicated years to studying the rare Ipswich Sparrow, which nests only here.

What emerges is that Sable Island is for the Canadians what the Galapagos are for the people of Ecuador, or Easter Island for Chileans. It is important scientifically and historically, but more than this it is important culturally, as part of their identity.

Producer: Julian May.

First broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in December 2009.

Living World - Green Hairstreak

LIVING WORLD - GREEN HAIRSTREAK (320kbs-m4a/49mb/21mins)
BBC Radio 4 broadcast: 10th August 2014

The Living World is a natural history strand that revels in rich encounter, immersion in the natural world and warm, enthusiastic story telling.

The Green Hairstreak butterfly is small, bright green and feisty. The males fight for females, spiralling in the air at break neck speed. This lovely butterfly was not recorded in the Pentland Hills, south of Edinburgh, until 20 years ago but now populations are being discovered in more and more places. Sensitive management is helping bring back this bright jewel to the bilberry and heather clad hills. By excluding sheep and letting gorse and bilberry grow together the right conditions now exist. Green Hairstreak only appear on the wing in May and Victor Partridge takes Mary Colwell to see where he first spotted them in the Pentland Hills.

Living World - The Dance Of The Dragonfiles

LIVING WORLD - THE DANCE OF THE DRAGONFILES (320kbs-m4a/50mb/22mins)
BBC Radio 4 broadcast: 4th September 2016

Chris Packham relives programmes from The Living World archives.

In many ways 1985 changed Raury MacKenzie-Dodds' life. Idly walking along a London canal towpath a dragonfly landed on his shirt. So mesmerised was Raury by the beauty and form of this dazzling 'devils darning needle' as dragonflies are sometimes known, that a few years later he created the Ashton Water Dragonfly Sanctuary in Nottinghamshire.

In this programme from 1994 Lionel Kelleway travels to the Dragonfly Sanctuary to discover for himself why these aerial predators delight Raury so much. With them is dragonfly ecologist Erica Towner who's studies are providing a vital link between dragonflies and a changing environment.

Producer: Andrew Dawes

Living World - A Visit To Shetland (Bobby Tulloch)

LIVING WORLD - A VISIT TO SHETLAND (BOBBY TULLOCH) (320kbs-m4a/50mb/21mins)
BBC Radio 4 broadcast: 17th March 2019

In the 50 years of Living World it has traveled across almost every corner of the British Isles, sometimes it is a contributor rather than the wildlife which attracts attention. In this Living World from 1974 Peter France headed up to Shetland to meet the late Bobby Tulloch, who was then working for the RSPB. When Living World visited the arrival of the Shetland Oil industry was just in its planning stage and so this unique archive programme provides a glimpse back to those days. Bobby Tulloch himself rose to fame a few years before Living World visited as the finder of a Snowy Owl nest on Fetlar, the first ever substantiated record in Britain. In this programme Bobby takes Peter to the Snowy Owl site, along the way exploring some of the other wildlife in this 'Land of the Simmer Dim'

In the decades since this episode was first broadcast, Shetland's wildlife has changed and adapted. Today there is a museum containing Bobby Tulloch's archive, The Old Haa Museum and Visitor Centre on the island of Yell. Wildlife presenter Lindsey Chapman revisits this Living World and gently updates the story for today's audience.

Producer Andrew Dawes