Recyclenow

The Recyclenow website (www.recyclenow.com) is a useful site that that explains what you can do with various items, what can and cannot be re-used, fact sheets about recycling, and videos on how the process works. And it's easy to find your way around.

Phil Bradley in CILIP Update, July 2014

Cucumber

Outdoor types

Sow: April in pots; plant out when danger of frost has passed.

Aspect: Maximum sun but sheltered from wind as the large leaves are vulnerable to wind damage. Well-drained but moisture-retentive soil.

Care: Plant on a mound. Handle plants with care as stems are brittle. Try growing plants against a cane towards a trellis. Do not remove male flowers as these are needed to form fruits of outdoor varieties. Pinch out growing tips when they reach the top of the support.

Water: Regularly, especially when fruiting well.

Harvest: Pick when 6" to 8" long.

Don't grow by: Potatoes or aromatic herbs like sage and mint.

Reduce Musty Smells

To freshen up old books, place in a plastic bag with scrunched up newspaper to absorb dampness and odour.

All About Dogs

Different dogs display normal behaviours according to their breed, and won't necessarily fit into a home environment, so it is crucial to select the right breed of dog based on your lifestyle now.

Collies have been bred to herd, retrievers to fetch things and terriers to dig a hole and bury stuff. The Northern Inuit, the husky and the Alaskan malamutes are fun to have around and very intelligent, but suffer from extreme separation anxiety (not good if you are out all day), can be very boisterous and love to dig up your garden.

Bone behaviour. Terriers will dig a hole and bury it, some other breeds and cross-breeds will chew it for hours. Some dogs will bury food to save it for a rainy day; if you are being fed too much and are predisposed to living a feast or famine lifestyle, you're going to hoard food - which is why you may find your dog in bed with a bone being saved for later.

Normal dog behaviours include chewing, digging, barking at the doorbell or strangers, and guarding.

Barking can be a real problem and you can find various methods for dealing with this on the Internet; here are a selection. How to train a dog not to bark by Chris Smith;  3 ways to get Dogs to Stop Barking on WikiHow; a Training Checklist on BarkingDogs.net.

They guard that which they prize highly - their home, food, crate, your bed, you - which can be highly irritating and noisy. Any dog will guard if it's not taught to trade. A dog needs to learn that human hands bring things; they don't just take them away. A good way to get something away from your dog is to give them something else that is better in dog terms.You are not rewarding bad behaviour - dogs don't get our meaning of good and bad - just giving him something he wants more - a treat or a toy for instance.

Dogs need to be trained - they naturally rely on their instincts to survive in the wild. Everything you teach them is a learnt behaviour - sit, stay, leave, etc. This also explains negative behaviours: if your dog was kicked or taunted by small children before they came to you, they will remain wary of small children. Your dog will also be watching you for ways they can learn from you.

Before dogs became domesticated, the alpha dog would choose a higher sleeping ground than the rest of the pack.That's why dogs choose to sit on sofas and beds - not just because they are more comfortable.


Various sources including: Extract from Top Dog by Kate Bendix (Short Books) printed in Radio Times (6-12 Dec. 2014).

Buying a Car

What women really want

• A driving seat with female friendly positions
• More storage - especially somewhere safe to store your handbag
• Better seatbelt adjustment
• A roomier boot with easier access

When to buy

• In April, June and September, quarterly showroom targets are looming, so staff will be on the hunt for sales.
• The best month for a great deal is December, when dealers are trying to hit end-of-year targets.

How to buy
For maximum legal protection, go to a reputable local dealer. .Look for RAC approved dealers (racwarranty.co.uk/consumer). If you do want to buy privately, follow the rules below:

• View the car at the sellers address.
• Check its MOT for free at gov.uk
• Ask the seller for a full service history.
• Find out if the car has been stolen, written off by insurers or had outstanding finance at hpicheck.com
• Have the car checked by an auto expert.

What to buy

• The smaller the engine, the less fuel its uses.
• If you  regularly take long trips, look for a car with at least a 1.6L engine.
• Don't assume diesels are more economical, especially if you drive fewer than 16,000 miles and do lots of city driving.
• Hybrids are good for a mix of urban and motorway driving.
• Electric cars work best in a two-car household where one of you regularly drives between 40 and 75 miles daily and has access to a charging point.

Bargaining

• Negotiate the total price first, rather than focusing on monthly repayments.
• Be patient - ask if this is the best they can offer, then remain silent. It will encourage the salesperson to come up with something.
• Look for free servicing or an extended warranty.
• Be willing to walk away.

Good Housekeeping, April 2014

Social Media Overload

Cut Twitter noise at manageflitter.com. Once on the website, type in your Twitter username and it lists everyone you follow who tweets more than five times a day - then the option to unfollow (or mute) them.

Cull a Facebook story - facebook automatically moves big stories, such as relationship status, to the top of your feed as it considers them life events. And because so many people see it - then 'Like' and comment - it stays there for days. To hide it, click the drop-down arrow at the top right and choose one of the following options. 'I don't want to see this' gets rid of one story. 'Unfollow' hides any further news from that person and it's good for culling annoying adverts too.

Do a stealth Twitter edit on a computer by making lists. The list function divides followers into groups of your choice: family, friends, etc. Do it at twitter.com/*yourusername*/lists. Once set up, avoid twitter.com; it's easier to use hootsuite.com, a social media management site. Select the lists you want to see - people who aren't on them won't show up.

Do a stealth Twitter edit on a smartphone. Lists don't work on the app, so you need Twitter's best new feature, the mute button. On a user's Twitter profile, select the cog icon, then Mute. Their tweets and re-tweets no longer appear on your timeline, but they'll still be able to DM you, so your relationship won't be affected.

Feature in Glamour, September 2014

Build a Web Trail

There are several applications that allow you to design a trail around the web, so people can follow the trail and explore the various sites along the way. They can be used, for example, to introduce students to resources that will be useful in their studies. You can provide annotations and descriptions or not, as you prefer.

Jogtheweb www.jogtheweb.com
Trailmeme www.trailmeme.com
Pearltrees www.pearltrees.com
LiveBinders http://livebinders.com

While you're at it, you could also create a custom search engine by using the Google search engine creation tool at www.google.com/cse/

Phil Bradley in CILIP Update, May 2011

Baked Cheesecakes

Baked cheesecakes can somtimes split once you take them out of the oven.

To avoid this, once they are cooked, turn off the oven and leave the cheescake in the oven till cold.

Lorraine Pascal, BBC2 tv show, 26 Sept. 2014

Facts About Learning

Learning the facts about learning by Mark Easton (BBC website 26 November 2014)

School uniforms instil discipline and improve performance. Streaming pupils gets better results. Teaching assistants take the strain off hard-working teachers and help children learn. Wrong. Wrong. Wrong.

New government-commissioned research into "what works" suggests many of the approaches we think make a difference are either a waste of money or may make matters worse.

Uniform policy? NO. Schools that don't force pupils into blazers and ties are almost unheard of these days. But the best evidence is that a uniform policy makes no difference to attainment. If anything, it holds students back.

Setting and streaming? NO. Dividing pupils into classes of different abilities is a popular approach to improving standards, but research suggests that it leaves students a month behind those in mixed groups.

Teaching assistants? NO. Research suggests students in a class with a TA do not, on average, perform better than those in a class with only a teacher.

Longer lessons (block scheduling, in the jargon )? NO. The evidence is double-chemistry and triple-maths don't make for more accomplished chemists and mathematicians.

Repeating a year? NO. Giving pupils a chance to repeat a year if they are struggling is not only very expensive - on average, it leaves children four months behind.

Surprised? These are the findings of intensive analysis of data from across the world, part-funded by the Department for Education as part of the What Works Network, and recently published by the government.

So what does work?

Meta-cognition and self-regulation? YES. "What on earth is meta-cognition and self-regulation?" I hear some ask. It is hardly the chant at the school gates. But that phrase reflects the most effective way to improve educational outcomes, according to the evidence.

Meta-cognition is often described as "learning to learn" and what it means is giving children a range of strategies they can use to monitor and improve their own academic development. Self-regulation is developing the ability to motivate oneself to learn.

On average, introducing meta-cognition and self-regulation into the classroom has a high impact, with pupils making an average of eight months' additional progress. That is a phenomenal improvement.

Feedback? YES. Feedback is information given to pupils about how they are doing against their learning goals. In the workplace it might be part of an appraisal, and the evidence is that a similar approach works wonders in the classroom, increasing educational attainment by around eight months

Peer-tutoring? YES. If pupils work together in pairs or small groups to give each other explicit teaching support, the results can be dramatic - particularly with youngsters who struggle the most. This isn't about doing away with teachers, but it seems when working with their peers, children tend to take real responsibility for their teaching and their own learning.

Sometimes the tutoring can be reciprocal, with pupils alternating as tutor and tutee. Cross-age tutoring also has advantages for older and younger participants, it turns out. This intervention, on average, improves student performance by a GCSE grade.

One-to-one adult tutoring is, counter-intuitively, less effective and much more expensive than peer tutoring.

Homework in primary school doesn't make a lot of difference, nor does mentoring, performance pay for teachers, or the physical environment of the school.

Given all this evidence, it appears our debate about school standards is obsessed with the wrong things. We need to teach our children how to learn and give them more opportunity to learn from each other.

This government declares its commitment to evidence-based policies, so one must assume that the results of research it helped initiate will be disseminated to every head teacher in the land.

Wrapping Christmas Gifts

There's definitely an art to wrapping Christmas gifts and making them look stunning. It's better to watch a video clip, than to describe in print, so here are some links.

General tips

• Plants, circular tins, using oddments of paper, making a gift bag, decorative pleats: M&S Christmas 2014
• Bottle: simple shape ~~
• 10 challenging shapes

Into origami? You might like to try these. 

• Japanese style wrapping: ~~ box with fan detail ~~ box in department store style ~~ bottle with pleat detail ~~ bottle with extra bow ~~

Student Loans

Unless you have enough money to pay up front, without dipping into savings, then student loans are still the best way to pay for university. The majority of students will not clear the debt within the 30 year limit, so what they borrow is irrelevant.

How a Student Loan works (if you started university after 2012)

# Repayment:

• Graduates only start paying back once they earn more than £21,000 per year (2017). 
• Repayments are 9% of qualifying earnings for 30 years or until the debt is repaid in full, whichever comes first. If earnings drop below the threshold, repayments stop.

# Interest

• Interest is added to the loan from the first payment. While studying, it is the rate of inflation plus 3%.
• On graduation, the rate varies. (2017). Earn up to £21,000, interest rate is inflation. Earn £21,000 to £41,000, inflation plus up to 3%. Earn over £41,000, inflation plus 3%.

# What if fees go up? This is unlikely to affect how much graduates pay back, as this is based on what they earn post-university. E.g. earn £25,000 per year - repay £360 per year; earn £35,000 per year - pay back £1,260 per year. To work out repayment on any salary, use the calculator at studentloanrepayment.co.uk.

# Does the debt affect their ability to borrow other money?

• Student loans are not included on credit files (with the exception of students who started university before 1998 under the original loan system and defaulted.)
• But some credit card, mortgage and loan providers may ask about student loans on application forms to help them make a decision. Mortgage lenders, in particular, will take any regular outgoings into account when calculating how big a mortgage you can afford.

# Good debt v. bad debt? Many students are unaware of the financial consequences of over-spending but in today's world 'don't borrow' is not as helpful as knowing a few facts about debt.

• Good debt = student loan debt.
• Okay debt = a 0% overdraft that can be paid afterwards.
• Bad debt = credit card debt.
• Ugly debt = payday loans.

Suggest students take the quiz at moneysavingexpert.com/quiz/good-debt.

Source: Martin Lewis in Good Housekeeping, June 2017

*********************************************

Do you have a child off to an English university? If you are able to, you may feel tempted to pay their £9,000 a year tuition fees (2014 figures). It could be better financially for them to take out a tuition fee loan and / or maintenance loan.

Once they graduate they will need to repay the loans (which have a low interest rate) but will only start paying once their income goes over a specified level (£21,000 per year in 2014). Repayments are put on hold if their income drops below that level. Each year you pay back 9% of any income over the specified level. Around half of university students will never pay off their loan in full.

If you have money to pay the fees, why not put it in the bank, earning some interest and label it 'Child's home deposit'. Once they have graduated you will be able to produce a really useful deposit for a first home. £27,000 is about the average first-time buyer's deposit (2014). That will be more tangible - and appreciated - than paying off a loan that isn't really a debt.

Paul Lewis, RT Money feature in Radio Times, 6-12 September 2014.

Intermittent Fasting

Eating a very low calorie diet of around 25% of normal intake (500 calories for women, 600 for men) on one or two days a week and eating normally on the other days has been shown to (a) lower cholesterol, (b) lower blood pressure, (c) improve insulin sensitivity and (d) stimulates the brain and body to go into repair mode, and may potentially guard against degenerative brain diseases.

The 5:2 eating plan is based on intermittent fasting. On two (non-consecutive) days a week you eat only the low calorie diet of 500 / 600 calories while on the other days you eat normally. Restricting calorie intake does not  result in eating excessive amounts on the following day, while the long periods between eating are what stimulate the body to go into repair mode. In order to feel reasonably full on a calorie restricted day, foodstuffs are typically vegetables (high fibre, low calorie) and a small amount of protein.

Stay Safe and Private on Facebook

Reading all the scary things about how Facebook can be dangerous and how people can get access to information you'd rather they didn't, how do you keep safe?

This is a large area and rather than try and cover it here, I'd suggest '5 easy steps to stay safe and private on Facebook' from the ReadWriteWeb site (http://bit.ly/4AJ873).

Phili Bradley in CILIP Update

Green Party 2010

The Grren Party manifesto for the 2010 election included the following aspirations.

• Financial transaction tax.
• Abolition of upper limit for National Insurance contributions.
• Return of corporation tax to 30%.
• Increase Capital Gains tax to recipients highest income tax rate.
• Clamp down on tax havens.
• Reform of inheritance tax laws - base new laws on wealth of recipient rather than that of deceased.
• Cut working hours - 35 hour working week.
• Increase minimum wage to a 'living' wage.

• Scrap nuclear weapons.
• No more nuclear Power stations.
• Scrap subsidies for arms exports.

Christmas on the Internet

Snowflakes
How to make a 3D snowflake (http://www.wikihow.com/Make-a-3D-Paper-Snowflake)

4 ways to cut an elegant snowflake (http://www.wikihow.com/Cut-Elegant-Paper-Snowflakes)

Make a snowflake on MakeAFlake.com (http://www.wikihow.com/Make-a-Snowflake-on-MakeAFlake.Com)

Elves
Elf yourself (www.elfyourself.com) - upload a picture of yourself and end up looking like a dancing elf.

Christmas Teaching resources
From the Woodlands Junio School (http://resources.woodlands-junior.kent.sch.uk/teacher/christmas.html)

Father Christmas
Track Father Christmas on his travels on Christmas Eve at Norad Tracks Santa.

Fertility Facts

• Age is the single most important determining factor of a woman's fertility. The menopause is the menopause and your reproductive system starts ageing much earlier than that.
• As your age goes up, the likelihood of gestational diabetes, pre-eclampsia and difficulties in labour go up too.
• Older women having babies means more complicated pregnancies, and more babies who are born underweight or premature, which puts strain on maternity services.
• Younger women may be relying too much on IVF as a fallback. The success of IVF is linked to age. The success rate of one cycle of IVF is about 10% for women between 40 and 42, and under 5% for those between 42 and 44. The truth is that most people who try IVF after 40 will fail.

Good Housekeeping, April 2014

Facebook and Twitter for Historical Figures

Some museums have been experimenting with creating fake Facebook pages and Twitter feeds for historical figures connected with their subject focus or local area. If you want to have a go for your museum or village or town, read on.

The tool to create a fake Facebook wall (page) is at My Fake Wall www.myfakewall.com/ - you don't need to have a Facebook account, though it helps if you know what the layout is supposed to look like.

The fake Twitter builder is at http://faketweetbuilder.com - there are various options you can explore.

Phil Bradley in CILIP Update, May 2011

Portion Control (2)

Here are some more tips to help a move to a healthier eating plan.

• Can't say no to cake? Have just a small slice and (my tip) put the rest away, out of sight, and wait 15 minutes. Chances are you'll feel as satisfied as if you had eaten more.
• Cut your food into smaller pieces - it'll take longer to eat, allowing your body to signal that it's full before you have a chance to overeat.
• Switch hands - so if you're right handed, put your fork in your left hand. Having to work on your co-ordination will help you stay focused.
• Take one bite at a time - you'll eat more mindfully if you take small bites, chew them thoroughly and finish them one by one.

Good Housekeeping, June 2013

Frequent Swimmer Hair Care

If you are a frequent swimmer, you may find that the chlorine in swimming pool water leaves your hair dry and frizzy, and may even affect the colour of coloured hair. So here are a few tips from a trawl around the Internet.

1. Wet hair before your swim. Your hair takes up the water making it less easy for it to absorb the chlorinated water.
2. Some people also apply some conditioner or a small mount of a light oil (olive or coconut).
3. Wear a swim cap - this will keep much of your hair from contact with the chlorinated water.
4. Shampoo your hair well after swimming (even just a good rinse is better than nothing).
5. Then apply conditioner.
6. Leave to dry naturally - a microfibre towel is kind to the hair and it is best not to use a hairdryer.
7. Between swims, some people also recommend using a leave-in conditioner daily and a deep conditioner weekly.

25 Sep. 2014: If you look for them, there are some shampoos formulated for swimmers' hair care; examples are UltraSwim products and the Boots Sun, Swim & Gym range.

28 Jan. 2016: Before you swim, try putting on Philip Kingsley Swimcap, a protective, water-resistant cream, available from Marks & Spencer, £18.

Twitter and Tweets

Twitter Avatars This is the image associated with your Twitter account. Whether you use a photo of yourself or a logo depends on what you want to use Twitter for. If you are promoting a company or charity, the key element is the logo. If you use Twitter to chat to other people (who you might also meet at a conference, etc.) , then it's sensible to have a photograph that's immediately recognisable. If you don't want to use a photograph of yourself, choose some abstract image that people will come to associate with you, but best to steer clear of the little cartoony faces which tend to look much the same. (Dump the 'egg image' that is assigned by twitter when you sign up - it signals 'newbie'.)

Twitter hashtags The # symbol, called a hashtag, is used to mark keywords or topics in a Tweet. There are three sites that can tell you more about specific hashtags, though they all try and do slightly different things. They are: www.hashtags.org and www.twubs.com and www.tagdef.com.

Track retweets? (1) Sign in to your Twitter account and in the search bar type 'RT@accountname' and then you can select 'top' to see the most re-tweeted ones. (2) Retweetrank (www.retweetrank.com) lets you see how you rank with other Twitter users in terms of retweets. (3) use a tool called Tweetreach (http://tweetreach.com).

Tweetping (www.tweetping.net) provides a real time visualisation of tweets from around the world. The presentation is very high tech and it's quite astonishing, not to say hypnotic. It's only value seems to be to show how busy Twitter is, but it's worth a look.

Phil Bradley in CILIP Update (various dates)

Where Does Spam Come From?

Is there a source for information on working out where an email has come from? I sometimes get spam sent back to me that I supposedly sent out (though I didn't) and I want to see if I can track down the real sender.

There are lots of resources that will help you read and understand email headers, and the one I'd recommend is from the Stop Spam website (www.stopspam.org/email/headers.html).

Phil Bradley in CILIP Update

Mindful Eating

Rushing your food and snacking on the run - or in front of a TV or computer screen - almost ceratinly leads to overeating. Mindful eating - taking your time and genunely relishing each bite - curbs your desire to eat more than you need. With its origins in Buddhist teaching, it isn't about dieting or giving up foods, but rather about experiencing food more intensely. Try paying attention to the colours, smells, textures, flavours, temperatures and even the sounds (crunch!).

• When you eat, just eat. Turn off electronic gadgets and concentrate on what is in front of you.
• Take a (small) bite of food, then put daown your knife and fork.
• Chew patiently and contemplate the flavour and texture of your food, aiming for 25 to 30 chews for each mouthful.
• Put flowers and candles on the table before dinner to create a calm, unhurried environment.
• Try making it a regular habit - set aside one sit-down meal each week as an experiment in mindfulness.

Good Housekeeping, October 2013

Squashes

Acorn squashes are best for most gardens as they are not too large, easy to grow and the orange ones taste great.

Need 100 days to flower, set and ripen.

Sow: May for end of September harvest.

Email Accounts not needing Mobile Phone Numbers

Many email providers now seem to be demanding a mobile phone number as a security measure when signing up, particularly when they recognise a previously used IP address. Are there any solutions to this?

When this was posted on a discussion list, Andy Brisley came up with an answer: both www.mail.com and www.gmx.co.uk allow you to set up free email accounts without requiring mobile phone addresses.

Phil Bradley in CILIP Update, October 2013

100 Words

University of Warwick researchers Jonathan Solity and Janet Vousden carried out primary classroom research into an alternative reading strategy that teaches children to recognise just 100 words initially, which will do to read most written English, including books intended for adults. Adding an extra fifty words (as recommended by the national literacy strategy) meant children gained an understanding of only about 2% more of the texts.

The Early Reading Research Project reduced the incidence of children having problems with reading from 20-25% to less than 2%. It involved both phonics (the sound of letters and letter combinations) and sight vocabulary (recognising whole words from the letters in them).

While English appears to have a lot of irregular words, in fact a significant number are highly regular and could be taught through a very small number of skills. There are about 44 phonemes (sounds) but these are represented by a rather larger number of letter groupings. For example, an 'ee' sound might be 'ee' or 'ea' or 'ie'. By teaching children the 61 most common letter groupings, they can read around 70% of all the phonically regular words in adult literature.

The core 100 words accounted for 53% of all the words in a database of analysed adult texts, while just 16 words accounted for a quarter of all the words. Rather than trying to teach all the variations, the strategy focused instead on the most frequently occurring and 'phonic self-correcting'. For example, if a child learns that 'ea' has an 'ee' sound, they will initially trip over the phrase 'loaf of bread', but they know that doesn't make sense, so quickly correct it. The strategy could also help adults who struggled to read.

16 most frequent words: a, and, he, I, in, is, it, my, of, that, the, then, to, was, went, with.

100 high frequency words: a, about, after, all, am, an, and, are, as, at, away ## back, be, because, big, but, by ## call, came, can, come, could ## did, do, down ## for, from ## get, go, got ## had, has, have, he, her, here, him, his ## I, into, is, it ## last, like, little, live, look ## made. make, me, my ## new, next, not, now ## of, off, old, on, once, one, other, our, out, over ## put ## saw, said, see, she, so, some ## take, that, the, their, them, then, there, they, this, three, time, to, today, too, two ## up, us ## very ## was, we, were, went, what, when, will, with ## you.

BBC web site Friday 6th Dcember 2005

Man and Woman

In English we have the curious situation where 'man' and 'men' are also used to refer to 'men and women'. Over time the term for an adult male dropped out of usage, and the term for both genders was increasingly applied to males.

Old English, also known as Anglo-Saxon, is an early form of the English language that was spoken and written by the Anglo-Saxons and their descendants in parts of what are now England and southern and eastern Scotland between at least the mod-5th century and the mid-12th century.

• Mann or monn primarily meant an 'adult male human' but could also be used for a gender-neutral meaning of 'human', corresponding to Modern English 'person' or 'someone'.
• Wif meant 'female human'. With the suffix 'man' this became wifmann, then wimmann, then to wumman and finally to woman. The meaning of 'wif' narrowed to refer to a married woman - wife.
• Wer meant male human'. It survives in the form 'were' in werewolf.

Subsequent to the Norman Conquest, man began to be used more for 'male human', and by the late 1200s had begun to eclipse the use of 'wer'.

While the generic meaning of 'man' as referring to both genders declined, it is retained in, for example, everyman, mankind and no-man. With social changes in the late 20th century, new gender-neutral terms were coined: police officer, firefighter, sales assistant.

Basil

Sow: April in seed trays. Prick out into individual pots. Plant out in June. Seedlings are prone to 'damping off' (a fungal infection).

Care: Pinch off flowers as they appear as they coarsen the leaves.

Water: needs plenty of water as it grows.

Harvesting: Pick leaves from the stem tips, not the sides, to keep the plant bushy. And remove any flowers to prolong its life.

Allergies and Bacteria

Allergies are on the increase. In the industrialised west, around one third of people suffer from one or more allergies, whereas in hunter/gatherer tribes, only one on 1,500 people do. Interestingly, people in the west who are brought up in close proximity to animals, e.g. on a farm, have less allergies than those brought up in towns and cities. The steep increase in allergies in the last 30 years is too fast to be caused by genetic changes and is now thought to be related to bacteria.

Our bodies are hosts to a variety of bacteria - on our skin, in our mouths and in our guts. Gut bacteria, for example, not only help us to digest food but also seem to prime our immune system to recognise substances (e.g. pollen, foodstuffs) that are not harmful. People in the west have less variety in their bacteria than those in tribes living traditional lifestyles. Family members typically have similar bacterial species to each other, but allergic individuals have less bacterial variety than other family members.


The womb is a sterile place so we get our first bacteria at birth, as we pass through the vaginal canal, which itself changes to more lactobacillus species (known to have a protective affect) prior to birth. Our bacterial levels are then augmented via breast milk, which contains up to 700 species of bacteria. Other bacteria are ingested with food and as we interact with gardens, fields and woodland. But modern life is reducing the number of species of bacteria in some individuals.

• An increasing number of babies (around 25% at present in the UK) are born by Caesarian section, but a Norwegian study found that such babies are 52% more likely to suffer from asthma.
• Babies who spend time in incubators and intensive care units after birth have different combinations of bacteria from those born vaginally.
• These babies tend to have low levels of actinobacteria (in those with asthma) and bifidobacteria (in those with eczema).
• Allergic individuals have high levels of enterobacteriaceae, which is commonly found in intensive care units.
• Antibiotics not only kill bacteria that cause illness, but also kill beneficial bacteria in the gut. The use of antibiotics in early life (especially in the first year) appears to increase the risk of developing eczema by 40%.

Also:

• We spend far less time outside (and in contact with a variety of bacteria) than in the past - perhaps as little as 15% a day. 
• In paleolithic times, humans lived in small hunter/gatherer groups, perhaps as few as 20 to 30 individuals. With this size of population, only infections (e.g. intestinal worms) which did not kill the host would survive. By quietening down the immune system (which also became less sensitive to allergens), they would be tolerated and never completely eliminated. Crowd infections (e.g. measles) have taken their place but don't damp down the immune system.

Germ-free mice, bred in sterile environments, have a different lung structure to normal mice, which is damaged when exposed to allergens like dust mites, causing asthma like symptoms. Other research found that Clostridia bacteria could block peanut allergy in germ-free mice with no gut bacteria.

Faecal bacteriotherapy (or faecal microbial transplant) is a recent treatment for recurrent C. difficile infections, and increasingly for colitis and irritable bowel syndrome; it is also being investigated as a treatment for some neurological diseases, such as Parkinsons. It is now being speculated that it may be useful following antibiotic treatment to repopulate the gut flora, and even potentially as a treatment for allergies.

A sample of faeces from a healthy individual is treated to separate the bacteria from the food waste. The bacteria are then given to the patient by enema, colonoscope, nasogastric tube or naso-duodenal tube. Non-related donors (tested for a wide range of bacterial and parasitic infections) are preferred to family members (who may themselves carry C. difficile). Ongoing research aims to identify the important bacterial strains and to grow these anaerobically in the lab.

What should we do? Well, vaginal birth and breast feeding are ideal but not always possible. Boost bacteria levels by eating food that stimulates bacterial growth (fruit and vegetables). Probiotics provide limited help (but are not a cure for existing allergies). Antibiotics should be used only when necessary. Get outside (gardens, parks, or the countryside) as much as possible for more exposure to all sorts of bacteria. If you have a garden, the more types of plant you have, the better.

BBC Horizon programme Allergies: modern life and me, August 2014 and BBC website article 26 Aug. 2014.

Wikipedia Editing

Some pages on Wikipedia have proved controversial and biopgraphies of living people have proved particularly susceptible to malicious edits. In response, Wikipedia  previously kept such pages 'locked', sometimes for years; around 01.% of the 3.3m articles on the English Wikipedia are under edit protection.

Now a new system of editing is being trialled. The 'Pending Changes' tool is to be piloted with 2,000 pages, which will now be opened up to editing, even by anonymous and new users. Pending Changes works by having changes reviewed by trusted users before they appear on the main version of the article. A Pending Changes icon (a tiny magnifying glass near the article title) appears on the right side of any page that is part of the pilot.

Phil Bradley in CILIP Update, Aug. 2010