View of threshing machine and drive gears (NC 9569 1076). See MS/744/117 and DC33078, item 9

Description View of threshing machine and drive gears (NC 9569 1076). See MS/744/117 and DC33078, item 9

Collection Scottish Farm Buildings Survey

Catalogue Number SC 370676

Category On-line Digital Images

Copy of C 48459

Scope and Content Threshing machine and drive gears at Crackaig Farm, Highland Crackaig Farm, on the east coast of Sutherland, is on the estates of the Dukes of Sutherland. A sustained programme of agricultural improvement was begun on the estates in the 1790s which largely replaced the old methods of subsistence farming and the way of life associated with it. This shows the Reid's of Dingwall threshing machine installed in the 1920s. The original one installed when improvements began was water-powered, because Crackaig, like other farms in the area, is on a stream. The waterwheel pit and lade still existed when a survey of the farm was carried out in the late 1990s. By 1829 there were 36 lowland mixed farms on the coast, of which Crackaig was one. To reap good returns from the land, turnips, flax, barley, clover and oats were grown and a few farms, including Crackaig, grew wheat. Care had to be taken not to exhaust the fragile fertility of the local soil, so crops were rotated. Source: RCAHMS contribution to SCRAN.

Permalink http://canmore.org.uk/collection/370676

File Format (TIF) Tagged Image File Format bitmap