diff --git a/pom.xml b/pom.xml
index ca16216..f9044c5 100644
--- a/pom.xml
+++ b/pom.xml
@@ -1,16 +1,16 @@
 <?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
-<project xmlns="http://maven.apache.org/POM/4.0.0" xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"
-	xsi:schemaLocation="http://maven.apache.org/POM/4.0.0 http://maven.apache.org/maven-v4_0_0.xsd">
+<project xmlns="http://maven.apache.org/POM/4.0.0" xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance" xsi:schemaLocation="http://maven.apache.org/POM/4.0.0 http://maven.apache.org/maven-v4_0_0.xsd">
 
 	<modelVersion>4.0.0</modelVersion>
 
 	<parent>
 		<groupId>com.rometools</groupId>
 		<artifactId>rome-parent</artifactId>
-		<version>1.5.0-SNAPSHOT</version>
+		<version>1.6.0-SNAPSHOT</version>
 	</parent>
 
 	<artifactId>rome-fetcher</artifactId>
+	<version>1.6.0-SNAPSHOT</version>
 	<packaging>jar</packaging>
 
 	<name>rome-fetcher</name>
@@ -20,9 +20,9 @@
 	<url>http://rometools.github.io/rome-fetcher/</url>
 
 	<scm>
-		<connection>scm:git:git@github.com:rometools/rome-fetcher.git</connection>
-		<developerConnection>scm:git:git@github.com:rometools/rome-fetcher.git</developerConnection>
-		<url>https://github.com/rometools/rome-fetcher/</url>
+		<connection>scm:git:ssh://github.com/rometools/rome-fetcher.git</connection>
+		<developerConnection>scm:git:ssh://git@github.com/rometools/rome-fetcher.git</developerConnection>
+		<url>https://github.com/rometools/rome-fetcher</url>
 	</scm>
 
 	<developers>
@@ -68,7 +68,7 @@
 		<dependency>
 			<groupId>com.rometools</groupId>
 			<artifactId>rome</artifactId>
-            <version>1.5.0-SNAPSHOT</version>
+            <version>1.6.0-SNAPSHOT</version>
 		</dependency>
 		<dependency>
 			<groupId>commons-httpclient</groupId>
diff --git a/src/main/java/com/rometools/fetcher/impl/HttpClientFeedFetcher.java b/src/main/java/com/rometools/fetcher/impl/HttpClientFeedFetcher.java
index 67f99e7..3dadb58 100644
--- a/src/main/java/com/rometools/fetcher/impl/HttpClientFeedFetcher.java
+++ b/src/main/java/com/rometools/fetcher/impl/HttpClientFeedFetcher.java
@@ -21,6 +21,7 @@ import java.io.InputStream;
 import java.net.HttpURLConnection;
 import java.net.MalformedURLException;
 import java.net.URL;
+import java.util.Map;
 import java.util.zip.GZIPInputStream;
 
 import org.apache.commons.httpclient.Credentials;
@@ -50,6 +51,7 @@ public class HttpClientFeedFetcher extends AbstractFeedFetcher {
     private FeedFetcherCache feedInfoCache;
     private volatile HttpClientMethodCallbackIntf httpClientMethodCallback;
     private volatile HttpClientParams httpClientParams;
+    private Map<String,String> customRequestHeaders;
 
     public HttpClientFeedFetcher() {
         setHttpClientParams(new HttpClientParams());
@@ -160,6 +162,14 @@ public class HttpClientFeedFetcher extends AbstractFeedFetcher {
     public int getReadTimeout() {
         return getHttpClientParams().getSoTimeout();
     }
+    
+    /**
+     * Apply any request headers to the HTTP method call.
+     * @param customRequestHeaders
+     */
+    public synchronized void setCustomRequestHeaders(final Map<String,String> customRequestHeaders) {
+        this.customRequestHeaders = customRequestHeaders;
+    }
 
     @Override
     public SyndFeed retrieveFeed(final URL url) throws IllegalArgumentException, IOException, FeedException, FetcherException {
@@ -196,8 +206,18 @@ public class HttpClientFeedFetcher extends AbstractFeedFetcher {
         final String urlStr = feedUrl.toString();
 
         final HttpMethod method = new GetMethod(urlStr);
-        method.addRequestHeader("Accept-Encoding", "gzip");
-        method.addRequestHeader("User-Agent", userAgent);
+        if (customRequestHeaders == null) {
+        	method.addRequestHeader("Accept-Encoding", "gzip");
+            method.addRequestHeader("User-Agent", userAgent);
+        	
+        } else {
+        	for (final Map.Entry<String,String> entry : customRequestHeaders.entrySet()) {
+        		method.addRequestHeader(entry.getKey(), entry.getValue());
+        	}
+        	if (!customRequestHeaders.containsKey("Accept-Encoding")) method.addRequestHeader("Accept-Encoding", "gzip");
+        	if (!customRequestHeaders.containsKey("User-Agent")) method.addRequestHeader("User-Agent", userAgent);
+        }
+        
         method.setFollowRedirects(true);
 
         if (httpClientMethodCallback != null) {