‘A Day in Agriculture’ is Thursday, Sept. 29
Farmers are invited to be a part of AgWeb’s “A Day in Agriculture” set for Thursday, Sept. 29. The first-ever event, sponsored by Farm Journal Media, is designed to capture a snapshot of one day in agriculture by providing cross-country coverage and focusing on how one day of agriculture impacts billions of people.
Farmers can participate by sharing a blog post, sending a video to AgWeb showing what you are doing on the farm tomorrow, submitting several photos with captions of their farm or ranch, sending live Tweet updates at #DayinAg or posting on Facebook about how you are involved in agriculture.
Also, please include how your business impacts the community. You can also call AgWeb editors and provide an audio update. If you want to join the fun, Upload your photos, videos and more here.
To learn more about “A Day in Agriculture,” click here.
Over the years my three sons trained over a dozen teams of oxen for 4-H. The last teams of oxen left my farm in Epsom, NH in 2006 when college intervened. Here are Rex and Dun (Irish Dexter oxen in front) and Celt and Cork (British Devon oxen) with their teamster, Myles Matteson.
Both of these teams are fully grown. Irish Dexters are a multipurpose miniature breed that would give an appropriate amount of milk for a family, as well as provide meat and draft power.
Both teams are “oxen”, which means they are over 4 years old and work in a yoke. When teams are younger they are called working steers, which means they are young castrated bulls that have been trained to yoke-work.
To learn more you can log onto the NH 4-H Working Steer site (http://extension.unh.edu/4H/NH4-HWorkingSteerProject.htm) , check out the fact sheet (http://extension.unh.edu/resources/files/Resource001340_Rep1784.pdf) , or defer to the expert, Drew Conroy (http://www.tillersinternational.org/oxen/resources_techguides/AdvancedTrainingTechniquesforOxenTechGuide.pdf).
Tiller’s International (http://www.tillersinternational.org/) is a non-profit organization for international rural development, specializing in farming with oxen based out of Scotts, Michigan.
By: SHM on 09/28/2011
at 10:04 am
This is unrelated to the post, but related to the picture. Oxen seem a lot smaller than I thought they were. Are these babies?
By: Tisa on 09/28/2011
at 9:42 am