Another one is agriculture. There were always groups of migrant workers who either worked at specialist activities such as ploughing or sheep shearing, or who simply worked as casual labourers at times of peak activity, especially harvest time.

In North East England in the late 19th/Early 20th century a lot of Irishmen came to work the fields at harvest time. They almost certainly brought their tunes with them as there are tunes of Irish origin in the Northumbrian repertoire. In some cases the tunes got renamed - the Boys of Bluehill becoming the Lads of North Tyne is a good example. Equally probable is that the Irish labourers took home a bunch of new tunes that they learned from the locals.