DaveRo there was mass movement off the land and both migration and emigration from the Lowlands of Scotland too. In fact some places like Berwickshire (which is on the English border) lost a higher percentage of folk than the vast bulk of Highland counties did in their peak period. It is just that the Highland Clearances were slightly later and more abrupt and are entrenched in the nation's consciousness more than the movement of the land in the Lowlands. Hence it still being called "Improvement" in the Lowlands. In the 1690s the north-east Lowlands lost vast amounts of people too during the so called ill-years. There was a massive movement off the land in England too and of course substantial emigration. Nothing in Britain on the scale of the Irish famine though!