Rural Heritage April/May 2026

Example of the light tire pulling set up used in early training with an eye-hook bolted into a tire, tied to a carabiner for the yoke ring.

animals. Much of what teamsters have to do while managing a team of steers is anticipate what other people are going to do around the animals and how it will affect them, and vice versa. Being able to set boundaries with crowds of people and your steers is paramount to the safety and comfort of all involved. Reflecting back on this fair, it seems incredibly elementary compared to where my steers would be just a couple of months later, but it was a building block for their ability to be relaxed and competent at later events. UNH Large Animal Handling Lab A month later, in early September, I brought my team to the University of New Hampshire to participate in an animal handling and behavior lab. My team was just shy of 4 months old and were one of two teams at the lab. Professor Drew Conroy’s

disease. If you choose to avoid fairs and other open events with minimal disease control, there are many ways to desensitize your team at home. This small county fair was a great environment, filled with livestock and people who were great for helping with desensitization. I made sure that a family member or I was always with my young team to ensure that they were not put in any dangerous situations. It was important that I was able to communicate with eager visitors that my team was young and nervous around new people, but I allowed everyone to approach them slowly and pet them even when the steers were not comfortable with being petted. By the end of the day, they were much more open to strangers and seemed to be having a great time interacting with many people across the fairgrounds. One of the most important things to learn as a teamster is to work with people as well as

April/May 2026

37