The mill is referred to on the Hope Map of 1769 and is readily viewed once you cross the golf course and as you pass the Garpit Farm on the route to the Morton Lochs Nature Reserve. Grave No. 120 in the auld kirkyard list, shows John Berrie as the tenant of Ferrie Mill at the time of his death in 1757. The mill lade runs through the middle of the building with its date stone of 1817. In 1861 the miller was listed as a Mr. D. Rodger. The water was brought from the location of former Ninewells Farm on the Morton Lochs access road, via what is now the 6th hole of the golf course known as the (Garpit) Pond Hole.

Morton Farm is located just past the Morton Lochs, in the parish of Forgan. It was formerly three quarters in the Regality of St Andrews and one quarter in the Barony of Leuchars and writs from the time of James Sharp, Archbishop of St. Andrews to Peter Hay along with more contemporary records, show it was in the Hay family ownership from 1662 and continued until 1905. The land contains an old Hay family burial ground from that time, with fallen ornate headstones. Under the ownership and support of farmer Gordon Sim, who later became Chairman of the Community Council, archaeological explorations for early  stone age activities of the hunter-gatherer-fishermen, were initiated by an enthusiastic local archaeologist Reg Candow in the early 1960s. Candow subsequently took part in a number of professional explorations which took place in the nearby Quarry Field between 1967 and 1980 and his book “Prehistoric Morton” (1989) gives a fascinating account of the evidence of earliest human occupation on mainland Scotland some 8,000 years ago.  www.pastmap.co.uk

The lochs were Initially created privately in 1906 by farmer Peter Christie for rearing fish. He diverted the Ninewells Burn to what was low-lying  sandy moorland between the irregular low dune ridges parallel to the coast. The purchase of the 59 acres of land for the Nature Reserve from the Forestry Commission was completed in 1956. The Ninewells Burn was the water source for the Ferrie Mill at Garpit and remained an important supply of water to the steam engines of Scott & Fyfe factory of Tayport until well into the mid 20th century.

Grouse were introduced to the links in 1876 by Admiral Maitland Dougall of Scotscraig and the first chicks bred to maturity in 1878 by his gamekeeper John Fowlis. Upon the death of the Laird in 1890, the shootings of Scotscraig were let to Sir Walter Corbet, Bart. and then William Berry. Although the conservation of grouse was always under threat by crows, the project continued until at least 1918. The Forestry Commission acquired circa 4100 acres of Tentsmuir in 1922/24 and apart from some trees which were around the main entrance to Fetterdale and on the coastal path section on the Muirs towards Comerton, the planting generally dates from then on.