Finlay discusses the diagnostic evidence of the Palaeolithic and Mesolithic largely comprising stone implements or spreads of lithic working sites which are distinctive both materially and typologically. Other evidence which is located in Scotland includes bone and antler tools, as well as evidence of diet from Oyster shell middens and hazelnuts (Finlay 2015, 3).
The use of lithics as a diagnostic tool has remained throughout the Clyde Valley in newly encountered sites. Analysis of the raw material recovered from Howburn Farm gave the interpretation that some raw material and stone tools were imported flint which is found in Yorkshire but is also thought to have been accessible on Doggerland thus indicating potential travelling routes. There is also a small percentage of tools, cores and debitage of locally occurring chert recovered which may show that people were gathering material and learning how to use it (Ballin et al 2018, 22).
While the nature of the remains of the Palaeolithic and Mesolithic is limited as single sites, we can infer some broad information of where people have been from the materials which they used. This is highlighted by Finlay and discussed that a landscape approach must be taken but due to developments such as forestry plantations much of the unknown resource may have already been destroyed (2015, 6).
Similar evidence recovered from the Chest of Dee, Aberdeenshire, was assessed and interpreted as an occasional settlement on a routeway showing how people exploited the local landscape. A set of Mesolithic pits, lithic scatters and quarry site on an upland flood plain showed that people utilitsed naturally occurring terraces as living spaces (Wickham-Jones et al, 32). A wide variety of activities were able to be interpreted such as manufacture and reworking of microliths on site, likely for plant and animal carcass processing, as well as possible dwelling sites, and cooking pits (Wickham-Jones et al, 37). We can understand this site with clear parallels with Daer Valley, as both exist within upland flood plains with similar sites located through excavation.
Evidence of resource gathering has been located at Burnetland, Scottish Borders as a series of chert quarry pits which sit outwith the Clyde Valley approximately 7km east of Howburn Farm. The quarry pits and associated spoil heaps were excavated by the BAG in 2000 which enabled the recovery of charcoal and the pits were able to be radiocarbon dated to the late Mesolithic (Ward 2007). The underlying geology within this area of Crawford Group Chert which is evident in discrete veins throughout the immediate landscape and so other extractive sites are possible which may have been lost or not yet discovered. The location of these quarry pits again shows a parallel with the Chest of Dee as extractive industry sites were also found, strengthening the argument for the early prehistoric use of the Biggar Gap as a routeway with complex patterns of use.