FROM 1830 - 1860 > FARMING                 1-10 11-20 21-30                 Employment Rules Shortly after the Famine labourers could earn slightly more than one shilling per day, but they were often subjected to tough rules ...     Potato Blight This potato plant has been infected with the blight. The disease spread rapidly in the humid weather of 1845. It was a sign that the ...     Blighted Potato This is what a blighted potato looks like. If you pressed your thumb into the centre it would be soft and mushy. Even animals would ...     The Discovery of Potato Blight This illustration captures the despair of rural people on discovering the potato blight. The lack of scientific knowledge about the ...     Loy Loys were the light spades used by Irish farm labourers. Spalpeens often carried their own loys.     Spalpeen 1 Spalpeens were itinerant farm labourers. Their numbers rose sharply in the decades before the Famine, with some even travelling to ...     Spalpeens 2 The word spalpeens comes from the Irish word spailpini. As farms became more mechanised, these spalpeens often had to go farther afield ...     Gathering Kelp In coastal areas, particularly along the west coast of Ireland, farming was often combined with fishing. Many of these coastal dwellers ...     Eviction During the Famine the rate of evictions rose rapidly, particularly in the western counties. This contemporary sketch shows a tenant ...     Cottiers This 1846 illustration shows the despair of a cottier family gazing at a rotten heap of potatoes. Cottiers and landless labourers were ...     <>               1-10 11-20 21-30