Agriculture

In the 1690s, Scotland was still very much ‘a country of peasants’, where rural life and methods of farming had altered little over generations. 

The earliest surviving rental valuations that include Meigle appear in the Rentall of the County of Perth of 1649, recording six proprietors holding ten estates. A glimpse of the people who lived and worked on these lands comes from the Perthshire Hearth Tax of 1691-92. The Fullarton return, for example, lists 15 households alongside the laird’s house - almost certainly small tenant families living and working in traditional fermtouns. 

However, within a few decades, this long-established order began to change. During the 18th and early 19th centuries the lands around Meigle were enclosed and subdivided, sheep were removed from arable ground, and marl was spread to restore fertility. The drive to improve brought greater productivity but swept away most traces of the earlier landscape. No pre-improvement dwellings survive here today; they have been erased by the same ploughs that brought progress. 

Strathmore occupies a transitional landscape, sitting just south of the Highland Boundary and thus poised between Highland and Lowland Scotland. The pace of agricultural improvement here was closer to the Lowland model: earlier, more commercially driven, and shaped by optimism rather than crisis. Historians now refer to a kind of ‘Lowland clearance’, distinct from the more traumatic Highland version, when the fermtouns of small tenants were re-organised into larger individual farms. 

For many the change was local and gradual: families often moved only a few miles to neighbouring villages and towns, finding new work and new homes without leaving the region.  

This pattern can be seen in the birth places of residents listed in 19th century censuses for Washington (Ardler), a planned village which was aimed at housing home workers in the weaving industry, but which would also have absorbed displaced former estate tenants. 

In fact, new agricultural skills were needed for hedging, draining, and marling, offering steady employment throughout the year, and the development of Washington ensured a local supply of farm workers remained available as paid labour rather than tenants. Housing also improved, with most of the farmhouses that can still be seen locally, along with many of the single-storey cottages, dating from this period.

Although the agricultural land around Meigle and Ardler is fertile and productive, the low-lying fields are prone to flooding. This is not surprising given its history: until the 18th century much of the area was marshland.  

However, by the 1790s great changes had taken place. In the words of the Minister for Meigle at the time, the Reverend James Playfair: “Since the year 1745…. improvements have been carried on with great ardour and success. At that time, the state of this country was rude beyond conception. The most fertile tracts were waste, or indifferently cultivated, and the bulk of the inhabitants were uncivilized.”  

Some 40 years later, in 1833, the Reverend James Mitchell wrote: “It is pretty well known in Scotland, that the farmers in Strathmore are amongst the most intelligent and enterprising of their profession. Great improvements have also been made in building gentlemen's seats, and tenants' houses, and the parish now presents a highly cultivated and pleasing aspect.” 

The occupations listed in 19th century censuses for Ardler reflect this new ‘improved’ way of farming that resulted from the land being drained. 

In the 1841 census James Symington is recorded as ‘Drainage Contractor’ (aged 40), with his wife Jane (38), daughter Mary Julia (5) and son James Thomas (1). James, Jane and Mary are all noted as having been born outside of Perthshire, while young James Thomas appears to have been born locally.   

By the 1851 census William Bisset (aged 43) is noted as a ‘Contractor of Drainage’, born in Kilspindie, with his wife Euphemia (33) from Errol, and six daughters: the oldest (12) born in Coupar Angus, the next four born in Newtyle, while the youngest (1) was born in Meigle. This suggests that there was plenty of work in this part of Strathmore for someone with his skills. Also listed is John Hey (aged 54) from Dundee, described as ‘Land Surveyor’, with his wife Janet (52), born in Meigle, and their son John (10) born in Dundee noted as ‘scholar’. We can imagine that with plenty of enclosure and agricultural improvement going on at this time there was likely to have been quite a demand for surveyors.   

In the 1861 ensus there are five named ‘Drainers’, all listed as being born in Ireland – Joseph Johnson (aged 38), Mattthew Grafton (33) and his wife Jane (30), Michael Broke (45) with a son (7) who was born in Alyth, James Riley (35) and his wife Matilda (39) from Leuchars in Fife, and Francis McManus (39) and his wife Elizabeth (39) from Errol, along with four children who who all born in Alyth - daughter Jane (10) and sons John (8), Francis (6) and James (3).   

Again, this suggests a fairly settled group of Irish ‘navvies’ in this part of Strathmore who were employed in the business of digging field drains in the mid-19th century. Some of their drains, some built with stone slabs, still survive below today’s plough level, though many of these are likely to have become blocked with the passage of time. 

The transformation of the once marshy lands around Meigle and Ardler into productive farmland was a remarkable achievement of 18th and 19th century enterprise. 

However, as modern flooding reminds us, the struggle between land and water is far from over. You only need to look at the fields between Kettins, Ardler and Meigle after heavy rain to see how much of the land is under water, and how quickly the land would return to bog if the drains were not maintained.