Working hard in Washington with real horse power

By GLYNIS HART
[email protected]
LEMPSTER  — Sometimes, the old way to do something is the best way. 

That was the moral of a story told at Lempster’s History Hall Friday night, when fifth-generation farmer Ed Thayer told the audience about working with draft horses. Thayer was involved in moving 10,000 lbs. of old steel bridge parts out of a designated wilderness area in 2013. In order to minimize the effects on the Lincoln Woods in the White Mountain National Forest, two teams of draft horses hauled the steel beams out on sleds in the dead of winter. 

Thayer is a member of Draft Animal Power network (DAPNet), an organization founded in 2009 that works to preserve and teach the use of draft animals. His family’s farm, Fletcher Farm in Washington, has been home to five generations of Thayers. The farm produces vegetables, meat, and maple syrup. Thayer uses two Belgian draft horses to plow the fields, pull hay wagons and sleds, and move lumber. 

“Draft power makes sense because it has an historical connection to the past, for me,” said Thayer. “It reduces dependence on fossil fuels. It has a low impact to soils in forestry and agriculture, and depending on the scale of your operation, it can reduce your overall cost. 

“Tractors are expensive,” said Thayer. His two horses, Ozzie and Tucker, were “rescues” — bought on the cheap at auction to prevent their going to the slaughterhouse. 

“For 11 years, we’ve been using them on the farm,” said Thayer. “We harvest pine for saw logs — we have a portable sawmill — and use the tops for the sugar house. And of course, we use the horses for fun — sleigh rides and hay rides.” 

In 2013 DAPNet partnered with the United States Forest Service (USFS) to remove a collection of old steel beams from Pemigewasset Wilderness in the White Mountain National Forest. This is New Hampshire’s largest wilderness area, designated in 1984. Between 1890 and 1950 the area was logged so intensively that part of it earned the name “Desolation Region” because of the destruction caused by the logging camps.

Old logging roads and temporary bridges remain in the wilderness, but it is no longer allowed to access the area by machinery. In addition, flooding and severe weather in 2011 washed out trails and dropped trees along the old rail beds. 

The steel beams USFS wanted to remove were part of an old pedestrian bridge adjacent to a rail trestle. DAPNet found grant funding for the removal project, and after two years of planning, Thayer said, they went in. The trails had to be cleared first and a way found to get the beams out. 

Many of the old logging railroads, he explained, were only built to last four or five years until that area was logged out. The railroads terminated at the nearest river, where the logs could be floated out. 

To sled the beams out, they had to go when snow was on the ground, so the project took place in January. They also had to get done before the weather changed, as freezing rain or mud could make it too hard on the horses and wreck the trail. 

On their first day out they had to move horses, humans, and all their gear three miles into the Lincoln Woods. It was -10 degrees F. 

After describing the project, Thayer showed a short film that made it clear just what an undertaking it was. One section of the trail dipped into a deep gully, so they used a block and tackle system to sling the beams over the gully. Another part involved a narrow wooden walking bridge. 

“If the horses refused to cross the bridge, that could have been the end of it,” said Thayer. However, the two draft teams moved all the beams, at 2,600 lbs. per load, over the course of two days. 

Thayer said they used the same design and wood for the “scoots” — the sleds used for hauling — that his grandfather did. “The scoots were made to be come apart,” he said. “We had one on one side of the gully and one on the other.” 

With the combined effort of “about 40” people, including Thayer’s wife Jane, the project was completed in two days. Horses and people went home in a collection of gas-powered vehicles, leaving the wilderness a little more pristine than it had been.  

For his part, Thayer still has a full-time job off the farm. “Eventually, that’s our goal,” he said. “To use our draft horses more and more.”