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Full-Text Articles in Life Sciences
Oxen: Status, Uses And Practices In The U.S.A., Encouraging A Historic Tradition To Thrive, Andrew B. Conroy
Oxen: Status, Uses And Practices In The U.S.A., Encouraging A Historic Tradition To Thrive, Andrew B. Conroy
Faculty Publications
Oxen in the United States of America have played an important role throughout its history. Unlike other countries,oxen were never completely given up for horses, mules, or tractors. Instead, the culture of keeping oxen has been maintained by a small group of teamsters in the North- eastern states collectively called New England. Their continued presence has been largely due to agricultural fairs and exhibitions where they have been used in competition for the last 200 years. Ox teamsters were sur- veyed in 2021via social media using Qualtrics. The 423 ox teamsters responding owned 1791 oxen in 39 states, with the …
Ox Yokes: Culture, Comfort And Animal Welfare, Andrew (Drew) B. Conroy
Ox Yokes: Culture, Comfort And Animal Welfare, Andrew (Drew) B. Conroy
Faculty Publications
Three yoking systems are used globally to capture the power of oxen. These are the head yoke, withers yoke, and neck yoke. Each system has its strengths and weaknesses, with culture and cattle playing a role in the adoption and use of each system. The neck yoke system offers important lessons in understanding animal comfort and yoke design. Despite its success, the neck yoke should not be universally adopted, nor should it be universally promoted. However ignoring the lessons learned in North America over the last 400 years would ignore animals and teamsters who perfected this system and learned to …