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The Depots, Rosedale East.


Worsdell forever
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It's been used for a very long time, the red (Raddle, Ruddle or as I knew it growing up, Rud) is a powdered iron ore mixed with oil to a thick smooth paste and smeared on with a wooden stick.

 

 

It's primary use is for identification, smeared in different places on the sheep's back to identify different flocks especially on the moors. I've passed sheep on the moors this morning, one group with red on the shoulders and anothers with green, it proves they stay in their flocks.

Raddle or ruddle is referred to in the novels of Thomas Hardy, writing late C19 but describing the 1830s or thereabouts.

 

Quite sophisticated now and not just for identification - the village green where we lived in Yorkshire until recently was grazed by sheep in the autumn as part of a conservation exercise (such are the times that, far from the farmer paying rent, he was actually being paid by the Parish Council for providing the service!). The green fell naturally into quarters and each was grazed for about three weeks while the ram did his business. To ensure all the ewes were covered, or at least which had been covered and when, thus indicating when they might be expected to lamb., the colour of the raddle that the ram carried in a sort of chest-mounted porous knapsack changed at intervals - red, yellow, blue, green.

 

One year there was virtually nothing on any ewe's back, and a replacement had to be installed.

 

Sadly, the village has had to abandon the practice, there being an excess of dog poo, which can carry nasties that cause ewes to abort. Bl**dy townies, as we used to say, most of us being, obviously, townies ourselves. The green is now losing its wildflowers as the grass, not being cropped right down, out-competes. (In fairness there are other issues: excess nutrients carried down by floodwaters from further upstream, and also from the use of the green as a leach field for increasing numbers of septic tanks which themselves are passing ever greater volumes of detergents etc rich in nitrates and phosphorus compounds).

 

Well, that's gone nicely off topic hasn't it! In a desperate attempt to bring us back on track, what were the sanitary arrangements for what must once have been quite a large population up in Rosedale?

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He must be colour blind, from recent pics the loco looks a bit too green to be crimson lake.

 

A bit to green to be green even.

 

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and the wheels are to close together. :blind:

 

Only joking P.

It's a very nice green.

 

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P

Edited by Porcy Mane
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  • 1 month later...

While I was making my list last night 1489 arrived to shunt the yard.

 

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How did that get there...

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So you played trains all night and made no list?

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