Goldenloch january 20, week 3 2014
In the early 1500s “Berryhoile lochen” first documented as a 25 acre inland loch that was a water, it was on the site of the now Golden Loch, it is noted on several early maps and documents, and was drained in or around 1540, it was drained by the local monastery at Lindores, Lindores Monastery which in its day was very famous as some say it was the origin of the first distillery, it certainly was famous for its manufacture of the water of life starting in 1494 called “Acqua Vitae” and it was produced for King James 1V, In our original farm titles it was noted that the land was drained to get to the fertile loam underneath to grow “root beet”, this we now know was used in the cooking of the wild boar which were caught and killed daily at the nearby “Falkland Palace” where Queen Mary was in resident, the Howe of Fife and indeed most of Fife at that time was forested, and was home to a huge wild boar population, from this root beet could be extracted sugar, this as a by product and in a world such as it was then it would be imagined could command a small fortune, the local farms including this one all have a history going back to that time and were all controlled by the Abbey and were all growing barley for the production of whiskey, in Newburgh there are many small wells and stories of stills, all to do with the whiskey production, which was as you could well imagine was getting out of control, Back to the Loch, this area as above was drained, the work was done by Irish labourers and they dug under the farm a tunnel, this tunnel which a person can walk up and extends many hundred of metres is under the fields and leads to the Goldenloch, or the then Berryhoile water, when I was a boy in the mid 60s my father the farmer here, decided to dig a hole to make an irrigation pond, this where there was a rather powerful artesian spring, this spring was always running, a massive amount of water even in the driest of years, the ideal place you would think to get water for irrigation, the digger driver only got down about 6ft when they struck the top of a man made object and as they scrapped away the soil it transpired they had come across a huge water impregnated oak door, with rusty metal hinges studs and ironwork, it could be argued that it should never have been disturbed, but in those days workers just did what they were supposed to do and get on with the job, the door was pulled off and discarded, this was the entrance to this tunnel, which is still there today, the water from the Goldenloch still runs out here and down towards Lindores loch and then on to the Abbey, the reinstating of the drained land at Berryhill was a decision taken by us as a family in the 1980s Mum and dad were getting older and my father wasn’t so able to go to the places he loved to go to, also by 1983/4 the local fisheries were really starting to get very busy and popular crowning it was the miners strike in 84, when hundreds of starving out of work lads were going poaching during the nights, looking for food, they were completely spoiling what was the fisheries that were already way overfished, So it was decided to recreate the loch which we knew at one time existed and in 1984 a hole was dug to allow the formation of basically a plug to lift the water level about 16 feet this construction was built by ourselves with the aid of Geordie NcNicol, a trusted worker that my father had taken on as a young boy, we called this the Monk and to this day it serves as the outflow for the Goldenloch and with its screens in place so as to not allow any fish to escape or swim in it controls the level of the loch, it outflows into the tunnel that I mentioned and the water feeds Lindores Loch.
All the rest has already been documented but next week I will copy and paste it to here.
To Book for Fishing, Call John on 01337840355 or 07968006367. or email john@goldenloch.co.uk or visit www.goldenloch.co.uk or our fb goldenlochfishing
In the early 1500s “Berryhoile lochen” first documented as a 25 acre inland loch that was a water, it was on the site of the now Golden Loch, it is noted on several early maps and documents, and was drained in or around 1540, it was drained by the local monastery at Lindores, Lindores Monastery which in its day was very famous as some say it was the origin of the first distillery, it certainly was famous for its manufacture of the water of life starting in 1494 called “Acqua Vitae” and it was produced for King James 1V, In our original farm titles it was noted that the land was drained to get to the fertile loam underneath to grow “root beet”, this we now know was used in the cooking of the wild boar which were caught and killed daily at the nearby “Falkland Palace” where Queen Mary was in resident, the Howe of Fife and indeed most of Fife at that time was forested, and was home to a huge wild boar population, from this root beet could be extracted sugar, this as a by product and in a world such as it was then it would be imagined could command a small fortune, the local farms including this one all have a history going back to that time and were all controlled by the Abbey and were all growing barley for the production of whiskey, in Newburgh there are many small wells and stories of stills, all to do with the whiskey production, which was as you could well imagine was getting out of control, Back to the Loch, this area as above was drained, the work was done by Irish labourers and they dug under the farm a tunnel, this tunnel which a person can walk up and extends many hundred of metres is under the fields and leads to the Goldenloch, or the then Berryhoile water, when I was a boy in the mid 60s my father the farmer here, decided to dig a hole to make an irrigation pond, this where there was a rather powerful artesian spring, this spring was always running, a massive amount of water even in the driest of years, the ideal place you would think to get water for irrigation, the digger driver only got down about 6ft when they struck the top of a man made object and as they scrapped away the soil it transpired they had come across a huge water impregnated oak door, with rusty metal hinges studs and ironwork, it could be argued that it should never have been disturbed, but in those days workers just did what they were supposed to do and get on with the job, the door was pulled off and discarded, this was the entrance to this tunnel, which is still there today, the water from the Goldenloch still runs out here and down towards Lindores loch and then on to the Abbey, the reinstating of the drained land at Berryhill was a decision taken by us as a family in the 1980s Mum and dad were getting older and my father wasn’t so able to go to the places he loved to go to, also by 1983/4 the local fisheries were really starting to get very busy and popular crowning it was the miners strike in 84, when hundreds of starving out of work lads were going poaching during the nights, looking for food, they were completely spoiling what was the fisheries that were already way overfished, So it was decided to recreate the loch which we knew at one time existed and in 1984 a hole was dug to allow the formation of basically a plug to lift the water level about 16 feet this construction was built by ourselves with the aid of Geordie NcNicol, a trusted worker that my father had taken on as a young boy, we called this the Monk and to this day it serves as the outflow for the Goldenloch and with its screens in place so as to not allow any fish to escape or swim in it controls the level of the loch, it outflows into the tunnel that I mentioned and the water feeds Lindores Loch.
All the rest has already been documented but next week I will copy and paste it to here.
To Book for Fishing, Call John on 01337840355 or 07968006367. or email john@goldenloch.co.uk or visit www.goldenloch.co.uk or our fb goldenlochfishing