Without Drama

Tillers' founder Dick Roosenberg often advises students of ox driving that a good way to approach plowing with a team is to remember that, when learning, the goal is not to plow.  The goal is to learn to plow.

I'd assume that the same logic would apply to other tasks:  Learn the task while acclimating the animals to the task.

Last week at Bent's Fort, we worked through the steps I like to follow when hitching to an unfamiliar object.  They may be overkill, but avoiding drama in hitching is a noble pursuit for both team and teamster.

Clark and Coolidge are quite used to pulling wagons and carts, both of which have a tongue.  I wasn't sure, though, that they were used to a chain. (In hindsight: of course they're used to a chain.  But I prefer a belt-and-suspenders approach)  Oxen are much more likely to tangle their feet in a chain and the bouncing and rattling motion chain makes some animals nervous.  Plus, wheeled vehicles and dragging objects sound different.

So we used these steps.  Feel free to modify at your discretion and as they apply to other "new" objects (wagons, mowers, rakes, carts, single yokes, brichen, etc.):

1. Rattle the chain around the team.

2.  Let them sniff the chain.

3.  Drag the chain away from the team.  This is an especially good strategy for new teams.  The object can make all the noise it wants, but as it heads away it's not perceived as a predatory threat.  With calves, half the time they get curious and "chase" the object.

4.  Drag the chain between the animals.  Chains look like snakes.

5. Hook the chain to the yoke.

6.  Hook the chain to the load (in our case a log, then later a 6-pound Napoleon cannon!)

7.  Step the team up one step and stop them.  I like to make that initial step glacial.  The moment they lean into the load I'm already whoaing them.  The goal is that the load makes a little noise, then immediately stops making noise and "chasing them."  To step right out quickly with rattling chains and noisy predators following, then chasing the team, you can get into a rapidly accelerating feedback loop in a hurry.  (Ask me how I know this!)

8.  Step the team up a couple of steps and stop them.

9.  Step the team up to walking pace then stop them.

Overkill?  Sure, but that always beats a runaway team.  If, at any step in the process, the team seems skittish, I like to unhook them and walk around a minute then go back to the "new" thing.  Cattle seem to have a sense that any new change is a permanent change.  Sort of, "Once I'm hooked to this wagon or wearing this yoke, my life will become nothing but this."  They can't envision a time in the future being unhooked, so it is reasonable for them to start thinking of escape.  A team looking to escape is unreliable.  Always.

"Recovering" a team that had a bad experience would follow the same process, just slower, maybe taking three to five sessions to acclimate the animals to the frightening object.  But what's the alternative?

One additional caveat for wheeled vehicles:  When the team stops, the vehicle keeps moving.  The first time this happens and the cart runs up on the team, they can panic and bolt.  The cart remains attached and "chases" them - like any good predator does - and that feedback loop accelerates in no time.  Mr. Roosenberg advises to always start new teams on carts heading UP a gentle incline to lessen the likelihood of this happening.

Clark and Coolidge really didn't need these steps, but moving slower to get farther, in the long run, makes sense.

No drama.

Walk a Straight Line

 'You stood on the shoulders of geniuses to accomplish something as fast as you could, and before you even knew what you had, you patented it, and packaged it, and slapped it on a plastic lunchbox, and now you wanna sell it.' - Ian Malcolm Jurassic Park Movie

“And because you can stand on the shoulders of giants, you can accomplish something quickly.” 
― Michael Crichton, Jurassic Park Book

Here I come, there Coolidge goes.

I don't have much original thought in ox driving.  I don't feel bad about this either.  I stand on the shoulders of giants.  Dulcy Perkins, the best teamster you'll ever come across, taught me, along with help from Rob Burdick.  Dick Roosenberg allowed me to observe his driving and teaching for years.  Vicki Solomon, Abby Johnson and Tim Harrigan each offered insightful advice in bite-sized pieces.  Howie and Andrew VanOrd poked and prodded my thinking on a number of topics.  Dale Parsons stood back and let my mistakes happen, offering support.  Anna Dirkse and Ivy Pagliari wove their teaching in alongside mine, gently correcting my problems or offering alternate-and-generally-more-successful strategies to accomplish tasks.  Marco and Polo made me look good when I wasn't, Hershel and Walker humbled me when I thought I had it, and Stan and Roy helped me to see what a team could really do.

Giants, I say.

Having said that, I have one original thought:  Walk a straight line.  At least until you shouldn't.  

Teamsters should walk straight lines while the animals should walk arcs.  When making a turn, for example, a right-handed turn, pick a spot to head to and simply to it.  The team should avoid you and, by doing so, they must make an arc.  The tighter the turn. the more it matters that you walk directly.

Try it.  You may have been doing it for years without thinking about it, but it works wonders for helping beginners to make tight turns on day one.  

Now stop walking straight lines.  Abby Johnson explained at the MODA Gathering a couple of years ago that getting a halter and heading towards an animal with intention is a recipe for the animal wandering off.  The fix is to meander a bit, approach in a seemingly unintentional way, like a nerdy kid moving in the hallway to "accidentally" bump into the cute girl.  (my metaphor not Abby's. . . I spent more time than I care to remember in one of those roles)

At Bent's Fort last week, this tip came back multiple times, as Clark and Coolidge had learned to avoid being haltered.  The meandering walk, along with lots of gentle brushing both in the corral and at the hitching post, returned them to an easy-to-catch team.  

There it is: My original thought.  Walk a straight line.  At least until you shouldn't.

Molly the Mule wants in on the brushing.

Stealthy Yoke Fashion Show

68 and sunny after school today, so Brutus and Cassius tried out their new yoke on a trip around the yard.  It's the 11-inch elm yoke, which has been my nemesis since June of 2017.  It's 95% done.  Some thoughts:

The boys aren't quite into an 11, but the 11-inch beam with their "old" 10-inch bows may be workable.

We won't know if the size is workable until we hook to something.

The new yoke needs hardware.

The plate and rings from the old yoke should bolt right on.

Double sided tape won't hold the hardware.  (No, I didn't try.)

The new yoke needs the holes drilled for the plate bolts.

Scary Beasts!

Without hardware, a team of oxen makes considerably less noise walking along.

The new yoke sure is a pretty stick of wood.

Stick out your Tongue

I like to work with two rings on a yoke: a "big ring" for the tongue and a "calabash," or a "grab ring" for the chain.  (They also go by the name "bitch link.") With that set-up, chains are no problem - even without a hook on the end - and the tongue to a cart or wagon is carried in the big ring while a chain carries all the draft, extending the life of the tongue.

But both the freight wagon and the caretta at Bent's Fort have a different tongue.  While it has a traditional tongue stop below, the load is carried by a loop of iron which passes through a pair of holes in the tongue.  Two cotter pins hold the loop in.

It's fast to hook and unhook, but I'm not sure the origin and would also like to see anyone's historic photo or drawing of it in use, just to be sure we weren't missing something about the hitching process.

Experts

I'm an expert on oxen. . . .As long as we define it like Mark Twain, who called an expert "An ordinary fellow from another town," and Will Rogers, who refined it as "A man fifty miles from home. . .with a briefcase."  By those definitions, I'm an expert here, away from home.

I'm writing this in the Denver Airport on my way back home from La Junta, Colorado and Bent's Old Fort.  I've been here for the week with my son, Lance, working with the staff at the fort and their team of Milking Devons, Clark and Coolidge.

The class was a "remote" version of Tillers' Oxen Basics.

We had a great and fulfilling week.  For the next few entries, plan on reading self-aggrandizing accounts of the successes.

I had no briefcase, but my two backpacks may have been sufficient.