Judy Griffiths

Horses and horse racing. Gardening. Topics around learning disabilities and autism.

[Martina Navratilova @Martina]

Worth a repost

[Sama Hoole @SamaHoole]

Gerald has a robin. Or, to be precise about the hierarchy, a robin has Gerald.

It turned up in autumn and simply took possession, the way robins do, and now it treats a nine-hundred-kilogram bull as its personal estate, its transport, and its dinner service. It rides on his back. It perches on a horn like a figurehead. It supervises the grazing from the gate with the stern air of a foreman. When Gerald moves to fresh grass, the robin moves with him, because Gerald is, frankly, the best thing that ever happened to it.

There is an ancient bargain underneath it. Long before there were gardeners for robins to pester, there were great grazing beasts, wild cattle and boar and bison, turning the earth and flushing out insects wherever they went. That famous robin boldness, the way one sits a foot from your spade with an expectant eye, was never about you. It is about the enormous animal you are standing in for. For thousands of years, a robin's finest meal ticket was to shadow something huge, heavy, and permanently eating.

Gerald is that something. Every hoof-fall in the wet grass turns up a beetle, a grub, a startled spider, and the robin is there to collect the rent. Gerald neither minds nor notices, which in his case comes to the same thing.

So one of the oldest partnerships in the country plays out in a field near Hereford. The little red tyrant, convinced he owns the bull. The bull, serenely letting him believe it.

Gerald grazes. The robin rides. Neither has read a word about the other, and between them they have it perfectly worked out, which is more than most of us can say.

[Mer Pol Mounted @MerPolMounted]

Silver & Beau enjoying a mutual groom
Mutual grooming is so important for horses -
🐴 it can strengthen bonds between them
🐴 reaches itchy spots they can’t reach
🐴 provides tactile stimulation that boosts their overall well being
#StandTall #PHSilver #PHBeau #MerpolMounted

[The Royal Family @RoyalFamily]

📕 With a shared passion for books and a deep commitment to children reading for pleasure, The Queen and author J.K. Rowling have met at the Palace of Holyroodhouse in Edinburgh.

Her Majesty and Ms Rowling discussed the importance of ensuring that young people have access to books and the vital part reading plays in opening doors for future generations.

[Helen Day @LBFlyawayhome]

50 years after posing as ‘Peter and Jane’ for Ladybird artist Martin Aitchison, these two recreated the scene for me.

Her smile!

[Janet Murray @jan_murray]

Yesterday this MP voted to support a clinical trial of puberty blockers for children as young as 11.

Today she’s proudly promoting Lush’s campaign to end animal testing.

Oh the irony. And what an interesting choice of campaign partner.

Lush has a history of promoting gender-affirming healthcare for children and young people, and was criticised only last week over a display that many felt glorified mastectomy scars associated with gender transition.

End testing on animals.
Support a puberty blocker trial for children.

Some people may struggle to reconcile those positions.

[Dartmoor Hillies @DartmoorHillies]

@Nikkipage44 @Keir_Starmer Come on @NaturalEngland!! The independent Fursdon Review has given you the solution. Implement Recommendation 27, remove Dartmoor Hill Ponies from livestock calculations, and secure their future before it’s too late #ponies #dartmoor @EmmaforWycombe @StephenMorganMP

[Humbug @HumbugAndToby]

We're officially calling today 'Eat An Ice Lolly For Breakfast Day'!
Tell the others! 😋
#EatAnIceLollyForBreakfastDay
#AMillionDegreesCelcius
#TooHotToTrot

[Jennifer Thetford-Kay @JenKteach]

On This Day in 1860: Florence Nightingale Establishes the World's First Professional Nursing School.

On or around mid-June 1860 (with the first probationers entering training on or near 24th June and the formal program often dated to 9th July), British nurse and social reformer Florence Nightingale opened the Nightingale Training School for Nurses at St Thomas' Hospital in London.

This marked a pivotal moment in medical history: the founding of the first secular, professional nursing school in the world, funded by the Nightingale Fund raised in gratitude for her Crimean War service.

She is famously known as "The Lady with the Lamp" for her tireless work tending British wounded soldiers during the Crimean War (1853–1856), where she dramatically reduced mortality rates through improved sanitation, ventilation, nutrition, and organisation. She used public donations (around £45,000, equivalent to millions today) to professionalise nursing, which was previously often seen as menial or disreputable work.

The school emphasised rigorous training, discipline, moral character, observation, and practical skills under matron Sarah Wardroper. Nightingale nurses went on to establish standards worldwide. The school later moved and evolved into today's Florence Nightingale Faculty of Nursing, Midwifery & Palliative Care at King's College London.

[Helen Day @LBFlyawayhome]

The Ladybird fan.
Mind your fingers
Artist: Gerald Witcomb (1976)

[Darlington Nursing Union @DarlingtonUnion]

Female changing room

[The Royal Family @RoyalFamily]

🏏 This morning, The King welcomed the Afghan national women’s cricket team to Clarence House.

The team was set up during the Afghan Republic in 2010, but lost recognition as a national team following the Taliban’s return to power. In Afghanistan, women and girls are banned from playing sport, along with other restrictions on their education, work and public life.

His Majesty was able to hear the stories of many of the players who fled Afghanistan and have rebuilt their lives as refugees, playing club cricket informally, and campaigning for recognition.

[J.K. Rowling @jk_rowling]

Trans women are men. All of them. It is impossible for a woman to be a trans woman. What you propose means women losing their sex-based rights. Those are the rights under discussion.

If you want to campaign for trans-identified men to have their own spaces away from other men, have at it. But you don’t want that, which proves that your priority isn’t those men’s safety. What you want is for women to sacrifice their safety, privacy and dignity to validate men’s identities. You are, in short, a men’s rights activist who berates women for saying no to your fellow men.

[Malcolm Snelgrove @snelgrovephoto]

One of my favourite images of a local Dartmoor Hill Pony stallion, moving across the moor with that vast, layered landscape behind him.

Photographed with a smaller aperture to soften the background, I wanted the scene to feel almost painterly but this image is about far more than aesthetics.

It quietly shows the habitat these ponies move through every day, and the role they play within it. As selective grazers, they create a mosaic of vegetation short grazed areas alongside longer stands which supports a wider range of wildlife.

In this foreground alone, you can see how the ponies are just about keeping the Molinia in check, allowing native heather to push through while also helping to manage gorse. Without that continual, natural movement and grazing, large areas would quickly become dominated by rank grasses, reducing both diversity and structure.

Over the past two decades, I’ve seen firsthand how important these ponies are to the landscape. Their presence isn’t just part of Dartmoor’s heritage it’s part of how the moor functions.

A balance is essential, but these ponies remain a key part of maintaining the character, biodiversity and resilience of this environment.

#snelgrove #wilddartmoor #dartmoorhillpony #dartmoor #ConservationGrazing #horsephotography

[Judy Griffiths @japgr]

@Chris_McClem Speaking up on their behalf doesn’t stop when our children become adults as we navigate new systems. See @cascaidr for info, alerts and courses on public law affecting adult social care and health, eg Care Act assessments and support plans.

[Akua Reindorf KC @akuareindorf]

This is what happens when politicians appear to condone the practice of ignoring legal judgments whilst "awaiting guidance", "carefully considering the ruling", "undertaking a review" and so on. The rule of law breaks down.

[Rosie Duffield MP @RosieDuffield1]

Infected blood, Thalidomide, Sodium Valproate - a few ongoing medical scandals, people still fighting for justice and compensation.
Imagine being Health Secretary for what, 3 months, and choosing to embrace the future scandal of giving 11 yr old children puberty blocking drugs.

[Duncan Bannatyne @DuncanBannatyne]

Please please, somebody. Anybody, stop this abuse of children.

[Sam_P @PallaviciniSam]

A six-year-old (or so) passerby to her mum - ‘look, mum, there are those people again who love sharing their bike’. I will never stop loving this - that the words ‘non verbal’ & ‘severe learning disabilities’ didn’t have to factor at all.

[James Esses @JamesEsses]

If you want to summarise just how messed up the United Kingdom is in a single sentence:

The UK government believes that 11 year olds are too young to watch YouTube but old enough to block their puberty and render themselves infertile.