Agriculture has historically been the primary industry of the English county of Cheshire. Dairy farming has predominated, and the county was particularly known for cheese-making.
Prehistoric era The area now forming Cheshire was sparsely populated during the entire prehistoric period compared with southern England.Thompson, pp. 2–4 The earliest archaeological evidence of farming dates from the Early Neolithic period (4000–3001 BC); excavations at Oversley Farm near Styal found remains of burnt cereals associated with an Early Neolithic rectangular timber structure.Revealing Cheshire's Past: Early Neolithic at Oversley Farm (Retrieved 25 March 2014) Burnt grain found at Tatton in association with post holes and flint artefacts dated to 3500–2900 BC has been interpreted as a transitory farming settlement.Revealing Cheshire's Past: Neolithic farming activity at Tatton village (Retrieved 25 March 2014) Local historian W.J. Varley speculates that the earliest Neolithic farmers cleared the forest to cultivate emmer wheat and barley using mattocks of bone or stone, and herded oxen, goats, sheep and pigs using dogs; they lacked ploughs and horses.Varley, p. 28
The absence of lime-rich basic soils and the high rainfall might have delayed Cheshire's agricultural exploitation compared with the adjacent areas of North Wales and the Peak District, with light soils overlaying sand, gravel or sandstone being cultivated before poorly drained clay soils.Varley, p. 32Higham, p. 21 In the Bronze Age, agricultural usage was largely concentrated on uplands in the Pennine fringe in the east of the county and the Mid Cheshire Ridge. This trend continued during the Iron Age, although there were some scattered lowland farmsteads such as at Bruen Stapleford.Revealing Cheshire's Past: Barrows to Bog Bodies (Retrieved 25 March 2014)
Roman occupation Pollen analysis suggests extensive forest clearance had occurred by or during the Roman period, although there is little evidence that the land was cultivated; felling could have been necessary to fuel the salt industry. Only limited evidence of Roman field systems has been found in the county; possible examples include Longley Farm, Kelsall, Pale Heights, Eddisbury and Somerford Hall, near Congleton.Higham, pp. 54–55 Spelt was grown at the Roman settlement of Wilderspool and a farmstead has been excavated at Birch Heath, Tarporley.Revealing Cheshire's Past: From Farm to Fortress (Retrieved 25 March 2014) Querns have been discovered at the settlement at Saltney, near the legionary fortress of Deva (Chester); the site has been suggested to have grown cereals for the garrison, although the heavy clay soil makes this less likely.Thompson, p. 16 Corn-drying ovens were installed at Cheshire's only known Roman villa at Eaton by Tarporley.
Domesday survey The Domesday survey of 1086 forms the first documentary evidence for agriculture in the county. The county continued to be sparsely populated at this date compared with southern England and the South Midlands.Husain, pp. 13–14Phillips & Phillips, pp. 28–29 The total population has been estimated to lie between 10,500 and 11,000, with a population density ranging from almost uninhabited in the east of the county to 20 per square mile in the Wirral and the valleys of the Dee, Gowy and Weaver. The county contained around 490 hides of farmed land, mainly in the west, where "hide" refers to a variable area probably equivalent to the land that could support a household. A total of 935 ploughlands was recorded, although there were only 456 plough teams. One interpretation of these figures is that only around 50% of the available arable land was in cultivation at the time of the survey, perhaps because much of the county had made only a limited recovery from the devastation caused by William I's suppression of the Mercian uprisings sixteen years previously.Husain, pp. 24–25 An alternative view is that some land had not previously been taxed.Phillips & Phillips, p. 30
At the time of the Domesday survey, mixed subsistence farming was the norm. The main crops grown were wheat, barley, oats and peas.Husain, pp. 33–34 Very little meadow was recorded in the Domesday survey; the majority lay in river valleys and probably represented water meadows. Though not mentioned in the survey, cattle, pigs and sheep were presumably the main livestock at this date.
Medieval and Tudor periods In the 12th century, the area was described as being "unproductive of cereals, especially of corn".Hewitt, p. 19 During the 12th to 14th centuries, the main crops were barley, oats and rye, with wheat also being frequently grown.Phillips & Phillips, p. 34 In the 15th and 16th centuries, barley and oats were grown across the county, with rye being largely concentrated in the south; wheat was also grown in some areas, although much of the land was unsuitable. Peas and beans were mainly grown in the north, and other crops included hemp and flax.Driver, p. 93 The three-field system of crop rotation appears not to have been commonly used in the county, with irregular field systems taking its place, as in much of northern England. There is evidence for around 250 commonly held open fields across Cheshire, which were generally smaller than those in the Midlands, and used a two-field or multiple-field pattern.Beck, p. 44 Oxen were usually preferred over horses for ploughing.Driver, pp. 94–95 Orchards were recorded in Chester in the 16th century. The designation of the three royal hunting forests of Mara and Mondrem, Macclesfield and Wirral, which at their height covered around 40% of the county, significantly slowed agricultural development within their boundaries.Husain, pp. 54–55, 72 The rise in population during the 12th and 13th centuries created a need for increased agricultural output, and trees were cleared in the forests (assarting) and marsh reclaimed for use as arable land.Driver, pp. 90–92 Agricultural efficiency also improved during this period with, for example, the practice of applying a clay and lime mixture termed marl as a fertiliser from the early 13th century, earlier than in much of Britain. Marl pits were common in some parts of the county.Hewitt, pp. 16–17Driver, pp. 92–93 Subsistence agriculture was gradually replaced by the trade of surplus produce at local markets and fairs.
By the early 14th century, cattle were frequently recorded straying in the hunting forests, and beef was exported from the county. There are records of dairy herds, for example at Macclesfield, in the mid-14th century.Hewitt, pp. 28–34 Large numbers of pigs were fed on acorns and nuts in the forests and woodland by right of pannage on payment of a fine, and pork was exported from the county in the 13th and 14th centuries.Husain, p. 69 Although the adjacent counties of Shropshire and Staffordshire were important in wool production, Cheshire was probably never a significant sheep-farming area, although it probably produced sufficient wool for domestic use.Hewitt, pp. 36–39 Large sheep farms were concentrated in the hilly areas of Macclesfield Forest and in cleared areas of Delamere.Driver, pp. 93–94
In Cheshire as elsewhere in England, clearance of land for agriculture was interrupted by the Black Death of 1348–51, when a substantial proportion of agricultural workers died. Small-scale enclosure of land for use as private arable fields or cattle pasture started in around the 15th century and escalated during the Tudor era, although town fields, remnants of the open-field system, remained until the late 18th or early 19th century.Beck, p. 46 Towards the end of the 14th century, some arable land was converted into pasture. Although the three royal forests remained protected wooded areas, by the mid-15th century, some areas had been cleared for use as pasture, especially in the upland regions of Macclesfield Forest, and all the forests continued to be used to pasture pigs and goats.Driver, pp. 88–90, 95 Although mixed farming remained the norm across the county throughout the medieval period, cattle farming increased during the 15th and early 16th centuries, with dairy cattle predominating in the south and west, and beef cattle in the north.Driver, pp. 4, 94
The dissolution of the monasteries saw the land farmed by the religious houses across the county being forfeit to the Crown between 1536 and 1540. Cheshire contained a higher proportion of monastic land than average, with most of the county's land belonging either to a monastery or to the Crown, and monastic land was in general well managed. St Werburgh's in Chester alone held 57 manors in Cheshire, and Vale Royal, Combermere and Norton also had considerable land holdings. Much of the land was sold or leased to lay members of the Cheshire gentry, creating large estates, although St Werburgh's holdings were used to endow the new cathedral.Driver, pp. 153, 156–57, 160–61Beck, pp. 96–104
17th century to the mid-19th century Cheese-making was already well established by the early years of the 17th century, when William Camden attested to the quality of the product:
In the mid-17th century, Cheshire cheese began to be sent by sea from Chester and Liverpool to the London market, and later to the North West. Subsequently, dairy farming and cheese production in the county expanded rapidly, becoming more commercialised. Farms started to pool their milk to make large cheeses for export in specialised dairies, a practice then sufficiently unusual to draw comment from travel-writer Celia Fiennes. By 1729, the trade with London has been estimated at 5,860 tons of cheese, and Cheshire cheese remained the leading brand on the London market until the mid-19th century. During this period, cheese continued to be made by hand, using traditional methods.
The Cheshire Agricultural Society met for the first time in 1838, with Stapleton Cotton, 1st Viscount Combermere as the first president.Latham, ed., 1999, p. 119
Mid-to-late 19th century By 1850, Cheshire cheese was being overtaken in popularity by Cheddar from Somerset, and over the following decades there was also increasing competition from cheeses made in the Netherlands and America. Cheshire dairies began to adopt modern production practices pioneered by Somerset innovator, Joseph Harding, but were slow to adopt industrial cheese-making practices developed in America. The proximity to rapidly growing urban centres, together with the expanding railway network, also led to an increase in the production of milk during this period, although cheese remained the county's major dairy product.
Epidemics of cattle disease, including foot and mouth disease in 1839, several outbreaks of pleuropneumonia, and rinderpest (cattle plague) in 1865–66, led to the formation of numerous friendly societies and mutual associations to provide assistance to farmers; several were sponsored by the landowners of the county's major estates, particularly Cholmondeley, Crewe and Peckforton. A short-lived cattle insurance company was also established in Knutsford in 1865. The 1865–66 rinderpest epidemic affected much of England but was particularly devastating in Cheshire; entire herds died and the county's economy collapsed for 18 months.
The land use survey of 1877 recorded of farmland, of which was permanent grass and was arable land, with additionally of orchards, of market gardens and of nursery grounds.A Vision of Britain through Time: Cheshire: Historical statistics: Agriculture and Land Use (Retrieved 4 June 2010)A Vision of Britain through Time: Cheshire: Historical statistics: Agriculture and Land Use (Retrieved 4 June 2010) In around 1870, John Marius Wilson's Imperial Gazetteer of England and Wales described the agriculture of the county: