Rosy (she/her)

I have 3 crazy cats and lots of opinions. I'm an avid knitter and tweet about anything I think of :)
Do unto others as you would have others do unto you!

[Rosy (she/her) @rosy_moo]

@rgarbra84 @Lucie_Fur99 But what about afterwards, are you wearing a damp, sandy swimming costume home again? That's going to get sore

[Sama Hoole @SamaHoole]

There are two Texel ewes that share Keith's field in summer.

They are not Keith's ewes. They are not part of any active breeding plan. They are two retired ewes that the farmer's wife took on from a flock dispersal in 2023, and that have been living on the bottom pasture of Dave's farm because the bottom pasture is, after Keith has worked it, in better condition for grazing than it has been in any of the previous tenancies the farm has known.

The ewes' names are Pat and Margaret.

Keith's relationship with Pat and Margaret is the following.

He ignores them.

Specifically, he ignores them in the way that a goat ignores sheep, which is not the way that, for example, a sheep ignores another sheep, or that a horse ignores a sheep, or that any other animal on this farm ignores any other animal. Keith's ignoring is structural. It is not absent-minded. He is aware of where Pat and Margaret are at all times. He simply does not allow this awareness to influence his behaviour.

Pat and Margaret are also aware of where Keith is at all times.

They have, however, learned to follow Keith.

Not closely. Not in any way that Keith has acknowledged. But when Keith opens a gate, Pat and Margaret are, on average, through it within four minutes. When Keith identifies a section of bramble that is going to be addressed, Pat and Margaret are nearby within ten. When Keith is on the barn roof, Pat and Margaret are usually in the shade of the barn, looking up at him with the specific patient expression of two old sheep who have decided that whatever the goat is doing is, on balance, probably worth being near.

Dave has noticed.

Dave has not mentioned it to Keith, because Keith would deny it.

Dave has also noticed that Pat and Margaret have, in their last two years on this farm, lambed at a rate that the previous flock-keeper would have considered impossible for ewes their age, eaten weeds they had not previously touched, and produced fleece that the local mill paid more for than any of their previous fleeces.

The ewes have got better.

The ewes have got better because they have been doing what the goat does.

The goat does not know they have been doing what the goat does.

This is, in agricultural terms, a mixed grazing system.

It is one of the oldest systems known to British farming. Cattle, sheep, and goats together, sharing pasture, each handling the vegetation the others won't touch, parasites broken up by interspecies grazing, the field improving over years rather than declining over months.

The system was lost when farms specialised after the war.

Dave did not set out to recreate it.

Dave bought a goat for the knotweed.

The system has reassembled itself.

Pat and Margaret are at the gate.

Keith is on the roof.

The pasture is the best it has ever been.

[Rosy (she/her) @rosy_moo]

@wendypink224 @iky_fwjett Like this? He's been known to stay there while I wash up, make sandwiches, take the rubbish out and even brush my teeth.

[Sangita Myska @SangitaMyska]

All my work on Donald J Trump’s illegal war gets throttled on X. If you feel like annoying Elon Musk and the President of the US, please do share it. Thank you 🙏🏽

[Rosy (she/her) @rosy_moo]

@DocEmUK @DishSmichri I had the challenging task of photographing my own tonsils because I thought I might have tonsillitis. I hate phone appointments because they give you a window of time and you can't specify not to call during the school run, if you miss the call you have to restart the process

[Rosy (she/her) @rosy_moo]

@delieberman Thank you for all you do

[Radigan Carter @radigancarter]

Got the wife evacuated, so have time to drink a tea and think about the Strait of Hormuz. I've sailed through the it a few times years ago and done antipiracy operations in the Strait of Malacca.

Maps can be deceiving. The best way to think about the Strait of Hormuz is a four lane highway, with two lanes per direction for the largest ships like crude carriers, cargo vessels, and warships in the center of the channel where it is deepest and free of obstacles.

Then on the outside of those lanes, you have medium sized ships, going Jebel Ali to other regional ports like Sohar, since a lot of international cargo goes direct to Jebel Ali then is cross loaded across the region.

On the outside of those lanes, along both coasts, are dhow fishing boats and all manner of local, smaller craft. Maritime trade crisscrossing this region goes back hundreds of years. The Portugese wrote how disappointing it was to find a tight network of trade already established in the region when they arrived in the 15th century.

It is hard to describe how crowded these waters are. You sometimes wonder if you could walk to Iran across the decks of ships and not get your feet wet.

The amount of traffic makes distinguishing between normal traffic and a threat incredibly difficult.

Is that dhow fishing, transiting between coasts, laying mines, gathering intelligence, or a tender for surface drones? Hard to discern while sailing ducks in a row escorting a lumbering tanker or cargo ship.

Operation Prosperity Guardian in the Red Sea proved to be a Houthi victory when a land power with no navy to speak of fought the most powerful navy on earth to an agreement.

The Hormuz problem is harder now the Iranians have proved they have the will to fight, no matter how much pain is leveled at them from afar.

The shipping lanes in the Strait of Hormuz go around the Musandam penninsula.

This turn exposes ships to 270 degree of fire control in layered systems from Qeshm, the surrounding high ground, to further inland, with surface drones now added to the mix.

Iran doesn't need to mine the entire strait. Iran just needs to turn that main shipping lanes around Musandam into a kill box and divert approved ships past Qeshm, out of the main shipping lanes like a watery weigh station. It has started doing this.

The U.S. has created a hard problem for itself.

NATO understandably wants nothing to do with this. If the most powerful navy in the world can't solve this, what difference does European navies make.

With the watery weigh station past Qeshm, Iran isn't closing the strait to global commerce. It is simply doing what the U.S. does with the dollar, exerting power over the chokepoint it controls.

Understandably the U.S. doesn't like this, so why can't the U.S. just send warships to escort ships through?

Well, when you escort a ship through a strait, you tend to stay ducks in a row.

So if warships are sent to escort tankers, they are now just another target in the strait.

Even if the warships could maneuver through local traffic to screen ships, lets go back to the 270 degree turn around the penninsula.

The warships would be receiving layered waves of fire likely worse than they faced off with in the Red Sea against the Houthis from essentially three directions while having the longer route to run to protect the tankers around the peninsula.

As the Hormuz Crisis drags on, anything less than breaking Iran's control of the strait will be seen as a loss for the U.S., much like the Battle of the Red Sea was against the Houthis.

[Rosy (she/her) @rosy_moo]

@LorenzoTheCat @X @Number10cat @Support we want Larry

[Rosy (she/her) @rosy_moo]

@aliciaandrz Dave helping me on the toilet. He helps me with everything. (Hopefully it raised a smile)

[Rosy (she/her) @rosy_moo]

@BarbaraDixon__ So adorable

[Rosy (she/her) @rosy_moo]

@RachelCDailey a lot of the taxi drivers I've encountered tend to lean more towards the Reform side of things so this doesn't surprise me unfortunately

[Rosy (she/her) @rosy_moo]

@MarinaPurkiss We had the ridiculous situation where our MP for Basingstoke (Andrew Hunter) defected from the Tories to the DUP.

[Rosy (she/her) @rosy_moo]

@piersmorgan Well that's a mature response

[Rosy (she/her) @rosy_moo]

@Mike_Batt @susie_dent @hayfestival Cy-bilus is another one

[Rosy (she/her) @rosy_moo]

@aliciaandrz Huge well done 💜

[Rosy (she/her) @rosy_moo]

@susie_dent I wish I was allowed to hurkle-durkle but my cat refuses to let me

[Rosy (she/her) @rosy_moo]

@KemiBadenoch Well done you just turned what should have been a moment of remembrance, respect and solidarity into another political point scoring exercise to sow more division.

[Rosy (she/her) @rosy_moo]

@JuliaHB1 Yes you do, try going for a job interview, voting, renting a property - you'll have to prove your ID.

[Rosy (she/her) @rosy_moo]

@aliciaandrz Wow that's fantastic news! Well done! 🎉