M'Dougall v. Buchanan

Subject_1 Landlord and Tenant Subject_2 Obligation to Stock adequately Subject_3 Obligation to cultivate according to rules of good husbandry Subject_4 Sublet — Landlord's hypothec. Facts: Held , (1) that a tenant is bound to stock his farm adequately, and to cultivate according to the rules of good husbandry, (2) that the stock must be the property of the tenant himself, as otherwise the landlord has no security that he can make his hypothec available.

This is a suspension of a decree of the Sheriff-court of Dumbartonshire pronounced in an action in which Mr Buchanan of Auchentorlie was pursuer, and his tenant in the farm of Dunerbuck was defender. The object of the action was to compel the tenant to stock his farm properly, and to cultivate according to the rules of good husbandry, and was based on the allegation that the pursuer had on his farm only three cows and one calf belonging to hmself.

The farm was a grass one. The defender did not say he had more stocking than was alleged by the pursuer, but maintained that there was enough plenishing on the farm otherwise to meet the landlord's hypothec.

The Sheriff-substitute ( Steele ) repelled the defences. His Lordship pronounced the following interlocutor:—

The defender also maintained that the summons ought to have concluded for the removing of the tenant from the farm, in the event of his failing to stock. But this is a mistake. In the case of Horn v. Maclean , 19th January 1830, it was decided that where the action is not founded on the Act of Sederunt, or on a conventional irritancy, the Sheriff has no power to decern the tenant to remove; but he may ordain the tenant to stock his farm where the action, as in the present instance, concludes simply for stocking.