Draft Animal Power Systems

Sterling College is one of the rare places where you can get hands-on draft animal experience, working daily with these heavy animals.

As a Draft Animal Power Systems minor you will learn single and team-hitching techniques, working with the animals to harrow, plow, log, till, and sugar. You will also acquire equipment maintenance skills and, in the winter, you can even learn to drive a sleigh. The minor is comprised of 15 credits of progressive, connected coursework.

All Draft Animal Minor students participate in instructional chores as part of each course, caring for the animals and stables. Through classes and chores, students get a holistic experience with our draft animal team; students learn care, control, harnessing, and driving principles and also the deep commitment and obligations involved with animal-powered farming and logging.

Says Rick Thomas, Draft Animal Educator and faculty member in Sustainable Agriculture, “I want students to understand that working animals across today’s agricultural landscape is a viable power option; that animals simply become the power head to move a variety of implements to do agriculture and woodlot work in a way that is tightly connected to ecological and natural farming practices.”

 

#1 Sterling College was the first college in the country to offer an undergraduate minor in Draft Animal Power Systems.

 

Why choose a minor in Draft Animal Power Systems?

At Sterling College, our approach to Sustainable Agriculture means looking at the entire landscape. You’ll learn how to match the right power system to today’s working farm, and that includes working with draft animals.

 Sterling College Draft Horse Minor

 

Draft Horse - Modern Farmer

Don’t just take our word for it! Modern Farmer explored our Draft Animal Management program for their December 2015 issue.

See Sterling’s draft horses in action!

The draft horses at Sterling College are members of our community. They are heavily involved in life at Sterling, helping with everything from the Sterling Farm and woodlot to producing the college’s maple sugar.

 

Examples of projects Sterling Draft Animal Power Systems Minors have worked on:

  • The Short End of the Stick: Calculating the effort of constant loads at three different evener orientations.
  • Feed and forage analysis for the working horse.
  • Horse as Therapy.
  • Cable and pulley system for extraction of out-of-reach logs for a horse-focused logging operation.
  • Rehabilitative hoof care: A case study in the management of sidebone and founder in a 10 year old mare.  
  • Analysis of three barefoot trimming systems: Application and adjustments for heavy horses.

Examples of organizations Sterling graduates have worked for:

  • Earthbound Forestry Services
  • Black Dirt Farm
  • Earthwise Farm & Forest
  • New Traditions Homestead
  • Boerson Farm

The list below includes required and elective courses for this major. Specific requirements can be found on the major checklist. Students are responsible for knowing the requirements for their major.

Title Course ID Credits Start Term Faculty
Draft Animal Power Systems I: Driving Principles AS174A 3 Long Block TBD
Draft Animal Power Systems II: Work Applications AS179 3 May Intensive Elsa Acerbo
Draft Animal Power Systems III: Farming with Draft Horses AS285 2 Long Block Elsa Acerbo
Farrier Science: Introduction to Horse and Cattle Hoof Trimming AS365A 3 Long Block TBD
Restorative Forestry AS274 4 Intensive Rick Thomas
Woodlot Practices AS105 2 Long Block Adrian Owens

  • Working with draft horses is exhilarating, physically exhausting, and one heck of a challenge. Yet, despite the challenge, I find this type of work very rewarding, and a humbling endeavor.

    Spencer Mast

    Class of 2017

Enhance your Sterling College degree with a Draft Animal Power Systems minor.

Learn how this course work can expand your horizons!

Apply Now!
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