Love Them Through It

Anna Peck works with oxen in northern New York. She was kind enough to stay late in her office at work to record our interview. Anna has a unique story: raised by her sister, she started showing cattle and then oxen in high school on the Vermont-New York state line and fell in love with it, piecing together advice from various mentors to teach herself to train oxen. Lately, she prefers driving single oxen and using the three-pad ox collar developed in Germany over the bow yoke common in the U.S. She offers advice on animal training and cattle breeds suited for oxen, as well as thoughts on raising a family alongside draft animals. Anna was one of many presenters at the 2024 Draft Animal Power Field Days in Montgomery, NY September 27–29, where she explained the 3-pad collar system and worked her single oxen Sam and Otis in the woods.