Mick 'the Dig' Worthington

Mick has been involved in archaeology for almost 20 years. Way back in the 1970s, resplendent in his flared trousers (long gone, but the hairstyle has survived), he got into mechanical engineering and received a HND. Stuck in a factory, he missed the outdoors and so got a job as an archaeological assistant. He was hired simply because he owned a yellow Morris Minor van and no one else on the team had transport. Although he got into archaeology because he hated working in a factory, Mick's favourite period is industrial archaeology. Some of this has been in the Potteries and at Ironbridge in Shropshire, near where he has built his own house.

Mick's most exciting archaeological adventure was when he went to Egypt with Bristol University's Dr Mark Horton (who appeared most recently in the Alveston bone cave programme in the 2001 series). Mick was the excavation photographer, snapping baskets and sandals that were thousands of years old. It wasn't all work, however: Mick and Mark had a very interesting afternoon off that involved alcohol, a felucca, the River Nile and a picnic basket.

As well as underground archaeology (Mick's interest in the industrial era has taken him down many mines), he also specialises in dendrochronology (dating timbers by comparing tree rings to those in a database of timber from the area). His advice to anyone who wants a career in archaeology is 'Don't – there's no money in it, so get a real job and do archaeology as a hobby!'

Unfortunately, Mick's digging days came to an end in 2001 as a result of dodgy knees, when doctors told him they couldn't sustain a life in the trenches. As a result, Mick has decided to concentrate on his dendrochronology work. He appeared in the 2002 series in his new capacity as a dendrochronologist, earning himself the new moniker of Mick 'the Twig' in the process.

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