THE HIGHLAND CATTLE ECONOMY

      Most of the clansfolk of the Central Highlands spent their lives as mountain pasturalists, skilled in the techniques of herding, judging mountain pastures and diagnosing the diseases of cattle, sheep and horses. The Macphersons of Cluny in particular had extensive hill grazings in Benalder which were famous in the 17th and 18th centuries for their garrons, the sturdy hill ponies which were sold to the Newcastle coal pit owners. The Macpherson chiefs were also known for their magnificent Scottish deerhounds one of which was presented to and cherished by the famous Scottish novelist and poet, Sir Walter Scott.

      Cattle formed the cash component in the traditional economy, producing surplus butter for local markets and bullocks for distant slaughter markets in the Lowlands and England. Herding was mainly a matter of moving the cattle from pasture to pasture in the hills according to the season, carrying out the milking and associated operations at the summer shieling villages in the high pastures and returning to the winter townships in the valley as the bad weather closed in. This movement was needed because the pastures near the winter townships would be otherwise overgrazed whereas the high pastures were uninhabitable in winter even for the hardy Highlanders. The word shieling (also spelled 'shealing') could refer to the summer pastures or the huts erected there to shield the herdsfolk from the weather. The Gaelic for shieling is airidh.

      In most cases it was the women and children who accompanied the cattle to the shielings while the men remained behind to sow the oat and barley crops, harvest the grain which would feed the family in the winter months and prepare the home to withstand the winter storms. The women were better adapted to the milking and the making of butter and cheese while the children ensured that the cows didn't stray. The shieling huts were simple and unpretentious with only the utensils needed for the preparation of their food, and the dairying operations carried out there; furniture was basic. Cooking was done on a peat fire laid on the floor and never allowed to go out because of the difficulty in restarting it. The original fire was likely started by a smouldering peat carried all the way from the winter township.

      Milk produced by the small Highland cows was, and indeed is, small in quantity, but in quality it resembles what in the Lowlands is known as cream. The butter and cheese made from such milk is unusually rich. During the day the shieling folk were engaged in making dairy produce, or watching the cows. Their idle moments were occupied in preparing wool, or at the spinning-wheel. At night they entertained themselves with singing songs and telling stories of fairies and other creatures of the netherworld. These were the scenes from which many of our most beautiful melodies and lyrical Gaelic poetry have emanated, for the shieling folk were wont to sing at their work. Much of what we know of the halcyon shieling life comes from these songs and stories.

      In the autumn the cattle were brought back to the winter townships. The breeding stock was kept; the bullocks and others that could not be supported through the long winter were placed in the care of the drovers.