406 MILK PRODUCTION IN S.W. SCOTLAND 



always heavy, so 1912 had not been a very propitious 

 year ; the turnip crops were below the average ; the oats, 

 we were told, had run too much to straw ; and even in 

 the first week of October some of the hay was still 

 out in the fields or just being led home. Considering 

 the land and the markets, rents were pretty high, at 

 an average of 233. an acre, but the farms were all taken 

 up and any vacancy produced a number of applicants. 

 As elsewhere in Scotland, labour was becoming scarce ; 

 every district had the same tale of emigration to tell. 



Before we crossed the Border we spent a little time 

 in the favoured valley of the Nith, where in the 

 neighbourhood of Dumfries there is a small arable 

 district worthy to be compared to the Lothians or the 

 choice Ayrshire coastland. Again one found the light 

 red soils, always workable with two horses and not 

 harmed by the folding of sheep, even with the heavy 

 rainfall of the west coast. Rents ran from 303. to 

 5 os. an acre; all the land is under the plough, and 

 milk, sheep, and potatoes earn most of the profits of 

 the farm. There is, however, a fair acreage of barley, 

 and some wheat is still grown in the district. Pota- 

 toes form a valuable crop, and one or two farmers 

 in favourable situations near Dumfries go in for early 

 potatoes as intensively and as skilfully as on the 

 Ayrshire coast. The milk is mostly sent by rail to 

 Glasgow or Newcastle ; when too far from the station 

 it is converted into cheese. Sheep are not bred, but 

 cross-breds are bought from the hills and set to 

 produce another lamb, lamb and ewe being fattened off 

 together, though some farmers make a speciality of early 

 lamb. It would be hard to picture a more delightful or 

 more fertile country than the valley of the Nith, which 

 showed again the general high level of farming that we 

 had noted before as a characteristic of Scotland. 



