Days Gone Forever..

[byron 1,093]

Oh the Droving Days are Done
And the Drovers’ Way is Run
For there’s Railways Laid
And they’ve taken the Trade
And the Droving days are Done.

A poem [anon] that sums up the end of hundreds of years of cattle droving. Quite an intricate job in its day, permission to cross land was required, routes to miss tolls mapped and signed in different ways. Example, many of you have come across a single Scots Pine growing alone, or maybe two or three together, far from where you would expect them to be. This was a sign by the land owner that drovers were welcome to camp on his land, or they were heading the right way..

Edited February 24, 2017 by byron

[C.green 3,203]

Interesting about the scots pines fair play ??

[j j m 6,480]

interesting

[Malt 379]

Amazing distances they used to travel back and forth, droving anything from cattle to geese! Would love to follow some of the old trails one day..

[The one 8,396]

Wonder they made any money walking all there stock for miles upon miles

[nans pat 2,575]

was this were the smithfield lurcher originated.

[Malt 379]

Wonder they made any money walking all there stock for miles upon miles

Only way they could mate. They used to drove them to West Wales to overwinter on the grazing here because its milder and our grass grows for more of the year. No lorries or trains to move animal food around the country back in those days, they moved their animals to the food or they starved to death in the winter..

[beast 1,884]

i read they used to drive the geese through sticky tar and then sand, so it protected their feet.

[byron 1,093]

the old drovers roads around this way,and would have been the same nationwide were usually a distance of sixteen miles..i think about the most you could drive stock in a day..all of the bigger villages around these ways..you've quessed it, approx. sixteen miles apart.. strange that a ploughman would plow a acre a day,, sixteen miles again..strange..oh ..and if your in to metal detecting,,find out were them old drovers fields are.. some interesting stuff come of some round these parts..