HIGHLAND LADIES A Brief Account of the Achievements of Women in the Development of the Highland Breed Over the centuries pedigree livestock breeding has been considered by many to be strictly a masculine domain. All the so called, great improvers were men and most of them bachelors. Names such as, Robert & Charles Colling, Amos & Anthony Cruikshank were pioneers in the Shorthorn world, while the Aberdeen Angus breed owes much to Hugh Watson and William McCombie, Benjamin Tomkins is credited with the early establishment of the Hereford breed, while the Ruby Red Devons have to thank Francis Quartly for their early development - not a female breeder amongst them. In the latter part of the eighteenth and the early decades of the nineteenth centuries when most of the afore-mentioned men were pondering breeding lines and pedigrees, traveling the length and breadth of the land searching for their ideal, whatever that was, the women were hard at work. Most of the everyday tasks: milking, butter and cheese making, rearing of young stock and in the summertime tending to all of the livestock on the shieling grounds, was the work of the women and children. When you go through today’s agricultural press you might get the impression that women’s involvement in agriculture is a relatively new concept; nothing could be further from the truth. Women of the working classes formed the backbone of agriculture, while those with greater means and leisure time pursued and popularized the interest in pedigree breeding. When it comes to our own Highland breed it was several decades after the formation of the Highland Cattle Society in 1884 before any female breeder, to whom I would like to give the honorific “Highland Lady”, made her presence felt. The new society was totally controlled by twenty gentlemen headed by His Grace the Duke of Athole K. T. The credit of first mention of a Highland Lady is to be found in the records of The Highland and Agricultural Society of Scotland, the report of the International Paris show held in 1856. The Hon Lady Menzies Rannoch Lodge gained 4th prize with her Highland cow and 5th prize with her Highland bull. Lady Menzies enjoyed further honours at the Highland and Agricultural Society’s show held in Kelso in 1872 gaining 1st and 2nd with her young Highland bulls, Rannoch and Peter. The same records go on to show that at the same event held in Aberdeen in 1858 Lady Pigot, of Chipppenham Park Cambridge gained 2nd prize with her young Highland bull, while at the Stirling show of 1864 Mrs Ewing of Strathleven House, Dumbarton was awarded 2nd prize for her young Highland bull Leven.
Miss Rosemary Dalglish being presented with the Braes of Greenock Challenge Bowl for the best yearling heifer at the October sale in Oban 1975 by Mrs Betty Walker wife of the president Mr Bill Walker Leys Castle. The heifer, Lady Ruadh 6th of Leachy sold for 600gs to Mrs A Gibson Cullerne House Findhorn.
It would be quite easy to assume from those early records that the involvement of Highland Ladies was solely in the hands of the aristocracy. Volume 3 of the herd book dispels this too, and we find Miss Jane McDonald of Scolpaig North Uist registering 14 females of Duntulm and Sutherland breeding. Some of the very best cross Highland cows I ever worked with over fifty years ago came from that very farm, and I wonder if they were the descendants of those cattle registered in 1888. In the same Volume we also find Mrs Wood of the Isle of Rassay with 21 females registered. In Volume 6 published in 1893 we find Mrs M. M. Cheape of Tiroran on the Isle of Mull laying the foundations of her fold with 4 females and two bulls. In Vol 16 of the herd book we find Lady Currie of Garth near Fortingall in Perthshire establishing what was to become one of the foremost folds of that era. The foundation stock came from some of the best breeding lines, Bochastle, Seafield and Kinlochmoidart. This strong foundation was soon to produce results for the Garth fold not only in the sale ring, where in 1918 Lady Currie’s yearling bull, Gaisgeach of Garth took first prize at the Oban bull sale selling for £180 to Archibald Turner, Kilchamaig, a very good price in those far of times. It is somewhat unfortunate to record according to press reports this promising youngster died the following summer. Further Oban bull sale success the following year saw their unplaced, Ridhire of Garth selling for £175. Lady Curry along with two other Highland Ladies were to make their presence felt in no small way at the Edinburgh Highland Show of 1919. The senior bull class saw Raounull Buidhe of Atholl belonging to the Garth
Highland Breeders’ Journal 2022 47
