Sods, Soil, and Spades: The Acadians at Grand Pré and Their Dykeland Legacy

Margaret Conrad is Canada Research Chair in Atlantic Canada Studies at
the University of New Brunswick. She is the author of Atlantic Canada: A
Region in the Making, and co-author of Intimate Relations: Family and
Community in Planter Nova Scotia, 1759–

Grand Pré, Nova Scotia, is a cultural landscape of rare historical and
environmental interest. Settled in the 1680s by French settlers who
moved up the Bay of Fundy from Port Royal, it became one of the most
populous communities in old Acadia and was immortalized by
Longfellow’s 1847 poem “Evangeline,” which chronicled the
expulsion of the Acadians from the community in 1755. Dykelands emerged
as a distinctive feature of Acadian agriculture, and they were
maintained and expanded by the settlers who took up the former Acadian
lands in the 1760s. Although much has been written on the Acadians and
their agricultural legacy, this book by biologist Sherman Bleakney
offers the most comprehensive study extant of dyke development at Grand
Pré and the surrounding area.

Bleakney almost literally left no stone unturned in his efforts to
trace the geological, botanical, technological, and human resources that
came together to form the Grand Pré landscape. A highly skilled
scientist, Bleakney has done his legwork, tracing by foot, boat, and air
the succession of dykes built over the past three centuries. He has also
consulted experts in a variety of fields related to his topic and
amassed a great deal of documentary evidence. His findings are presented
in 10 clearly written chapters covering such topics as tides, dyke
construction tools and techniques, rising sea levels, and eroding
shorelines. More than 100 maps, tables, images, and diagrams illustrate
the narrative, and 12 appendixes offer detailed information on
everything from the water and clay content of various sod types to a
list of early aerial photographs. Bleakney maintains that the Acadians
were as much a product of the land as was their agricultural output, but
he is less romantic about their successors from a variety of cultural
backgrounds whose fields still retain the shape they had taken by 1755.
Whatever the impact of the dykelands on the people who farmed them, this
book will go a long way toward satisfying the continuing curiosity about
the construction and evolution of the Grand Pré dykes.