Shepherds Lodge Kailyard
Archaeological and documentary research into the Bennachie Colony inevitably led to speculation concerning the kinds of lives the colonists lived. From this it was a small step to try to imagine the types of crops, agricultural methods and, in particular, gardening methods that were undertaken by the colonists. Even after almost two centuries of forestation, the ground still generates species that seem more appropriate to the landscape of the colonists than to subsequent generations of foresters. Geans, laurels, gooseberries and raspberries still linger around the slopes. Whether any are true descendants of the colonists’ gardens or simply later wind- or animal-borne interlopers is hard to determine. But, their presence alerts us to such a possibility. Further speculation arose concerning what a colonist’s garden might have looked like, what it may have produced and how it may have been managed. It is fair to say that Christine Foster became the architect and driving force behind the subsequent Shepherds Lodge experimental ‘kailyard’, ably supported by a raft of volunteer horticulturalists.
But, the gardening experiment began with a different kind of digging – one involving the other half of the formidable ‘Foster team’ and the archaeological brigade…
Foster, B. (2019) “Shepherds Lodge Kailyard: Pre-planting excavation”, BLOP9, in Shepherd, C. (ed) Bennachie and the Garioch: Society and Landscape in the History of North-east Scotland, 4 (Chapel of Garioch, Bailies of Bennachie) 47-52.
Foster, C. (2019) “The Bennachie Colony: re-creating a 19th-century ‘kailyard’”, BLOP10, in Shepherd, C. (ed) Bennachie and the Garioch: Society and Landscape in the History of North-east Scotland, 4 (Chapel of Garioch, Bailies of Bennachie) 53-64.