Has anyone tried teaching thier oxen to ride? I have a 5-year-old jersey x red angus ox that is trained to pull and now I would like to teach him to ride, but I'm slightly frustrated by the lack of information on the subject.

ridingsteers.com Abby rides her Jersey ox in the RH video Oxen for Work and Fun. Lots of kids ride their oxen. Just tie him, sit on him until he's comfortable, then proceed to walking.

I've been on mine a few times with my hubby leading the ox. They're pretty slippery! Don't get too far forward when the steer puts his head down!

Try Ridingsteers.com

I have trained a brown swiss bull and brahman cow to ride and still own the brahman. They both were well enough trained I rode them down our local country roads.

Gary Henry in Texas has produced a longhorn steer training video, on my website.

The real trick is to start them as a baby or if you wait, you really want to do some selection for attitude, because while I hesitate to say it is not possible to train all older cattle, I will say some are just not worth the bother or risk.

Well-broke working steers shouldn't be a problem to train to ride. I started prepping to ride as a baby by putting a sack with sawdust in it on its back/a saddle. The other I never started for riding until he was a little better than two. Both were worked with in the yoke from a young age, though. One thing to remember: they don't have withers like a horse, so a saddle will tend to slip forward when going down-hill.

They don't have a mouth that is like a horse's, either; I just used a halter with two leads attached to it. And, as they were working steers, they knew voice commands. I did carry a short stick to remind them if they became 'instructionally challenged'. I did all this when I was a young teen, and put enough miles riding them on the road, that they just about wore their feet out! (Actually, one did, and rather than shoe it, that is when I started with the other.)

One other 'hazard' about riding them; remember in the summer, those horns will hit just about knee-cap height when they are slatting at flies! (I got real good at turning my toe so they'd bump their nose before the horn would bump my knee!)

We've been training our cow (Connie) as a riding cow since she was a week old. We started by just standing over her in cow riding position. By the time she was big enough that our feet came off the ground she just considered it part of her normal routine.

She's almost 18 months old now, and we sit on her for a few minutes each day and lead her just enough that she continues to develop a feel for supporting our weight and coordinating that with her movement. We'll hold off on serious riding work until she reaches her adult size.

So far, so good though. She enjoys human attention and doesn't seem to consider a rider getting on to be any kind of bother. We've been doing a lot of work to teach her that we may come along at any time and interrupt her grazing for halter work or to sit on her - and we stacked things in our favor so that we didn't compete directly with prime hunger time during growth spurts.

Our long term riding goal is to have a cow that we can trust to double as an all terrain ambulance if we ever need one. We are really emphasizing training her to be willing to be called to work on demand over training her to work for long periods of time.

At this point she'll come when called (even if she's grazing) to a combination of voice and hand signal. The hand signal is us wiggling our fingers in "chin scratching" position. She also knows that when she's called it might be for chin scratching only, a bit of riding work, or 15 min to a half hour of halter leading or light pulling.

We still have some work to do on getting her to come to a call reliably when we are out of sight. She's got the general idea, but a good edible distraction sometimes wins out over an abstract, out of vision-range promise of chin scratching. Nothing that a few games of hide and seek with a pocketful of cow treats won't fix, though. :)

Lynda

My daughter trained her calf to ride and drive. Angel is 5 now and is fully convinced she is a horse. Granted she still has a strong resemblance of a red and white herford.
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She started by the norms halter broke, leading and working off voice cues. Then she went to driving with a modified sulky and harness.
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Saddle training was a learning experance for all of us note in this pic the way a cow moves when running.
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First time here being backed still just a haulter and a single lead.
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Hundreds of hours and years later Angel rides well with a hackmore bare back or under saddle. She has seemed to landed a perminent place among the horses and has been a corner stone project.
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In our case it's been like the old saying
$10 halter
$12 cart
$20 saddle
$100 calf
1000 hours of memories with your teen daughter--priceless.

Be careful never train alone and keep in mind what's really important in life.

I have just started training a 3 1/2 year old yak to ride. I trained him to drive first. He is pretty responsive and a lot more quiet than I thougt he would be.

Hello all. I post every now and again on this board. I've only ridden a horse three times in my life and always been into draft animals (city slicker). My draft animals have paws. I know this is a silly question, but what is the riding difference between draft horse, draft mule and an ox. I've checked out oxenriding.com months ago. How many people ride oxen and for what purpose? The owner of the site said it is easier on the back, and yes I understand oxen move slow. Thanks for any insight (from a city slicker).

I am enjoying reading all these comments on riding steers. We train our bull calves & heifers to do all sorts of things--riding, trick training and now harness driving (single, not teams). I would sure appreciate comments about harness driving experiences w/ your calves and any advice, especially on bitting, what size cart do you use? Cobsize seems to work best for us w/ large pony harness for our Texas Longhorn weanlings. How do you start your calves (ie dragging a tire w/ rigged up horse girth as a breast piece)? We get them used to shafts by feeding the calves in between parallel PVC pipes. Any ideas? Thanks.

Hey Joe IN!
Great pictures! What size sulky is that young lady of yours using w/ her hereford calf? Is it a large pony size or a cob size? Also, what size harness did you start with before modifying it?
DeeDee

Is that just a halter that you are driving the calf in, with no bit, just lines? And is that a mechanical hackemore that she's being ridden in?

Hi Zebu Rider
What is your site? I'd like to see the video of the steer training. Thanx!
-Coolkoe-

My 7 year old son is just now riding our 1&1/2 yr. old Dexter cow. I was wondering if that is to early of an age to start her. She responds well,already wears a saddle. She does however try to buck. My theory is just to ride again and again, and use trial and error. Do you have any suggestions on how to train her to ride and rein? I was also planning on using a halter with leads on each side, or modifying a hackamore.Please send me any advice! Our family is used to horses, cows are unknown territory!

We rode our 6 month old beef cows when we were young, but they were really stubborn and would not go. We use a stick and feed to get them to go. It is really hard to hold on when you are riding bare-back. We really had a fun time but we could never really break them so it was hard to get them to go and stop. Sometimes they brushed against trees to scrape our legs and went under low branches to scrape us of their backs.

We are getting a calf, and I want it to be trained to ride so that when she is shown at the fair, I can parade her around a bit. We want to start with a 4 mon. old, but is it too young? Would 5 or 6 months be better? Please let me know.
My Regards,
Loraine

Hi all,
I am a horse person and since buying my dream farm, a little homestead in New england, My 18 yr old came home one day in the spring with a tiny Jersey bull. His name is "Norman" and he is 5 mos old and the sweetest most adorable creature I ever had! She is off to college, animal science/pre-vet, ans I am left alone with 2 horses, a calf,and a goat and 11 chickens.We want to train him to ride. Right now we go on "dog" walks in the neighborhoodand he is perfect, ( after 3 walks) in 2 months! I handle him every day, and touch him all over and lift his feet. I tried putting on our mini's harness and it worked, he didn't even mind. So We are going to try to teach him to drive and ride. Wish us luck! Thnks to all the helpful comments everyone has made! Linda P.

dont keep a jersey bull around...they get really cranky

My parents won't let me have a horse however we have a barn full of cows and t


he one freshend last night to a beautiful baby girl and I am trying to talk my parents into letting me train it... Of course it being a beef cow my parents rudely retorted that "two years from now it will be the smartest cow going in for slaughter" I am hoping however to buy the calf from them so I can do what I want with it but the issue then is getting my parents to let me... Also I assume that the babies that start the training cycle at a young age are hand raised... Is it hard to train a baby that is to stay with its mom for two or three months before starting the training? Or is it the same? If I am to wait to train it how long should be the longest before I start?
Looking forward for some responses and any ideas on how to talk my parents into letting me do this!!
Thanks,
Mandie

cool

i have a young bull thats the sweetest thing and I was wondering if I could train him to ride, but I think he's to old and would be to dangerous. I haven't tried halter training him yet so I'll see how that goes. We scratch him all over and he loves it, doesn't even mind the dogs. But since he's not a calf and still a bull, I'm kinda scared. Any ideas?
Q

My parents will never let me get a horse or any pet, so I have decided to train my steer calf to be ridden. The only problem is that it is a beef cow, any ideas to what I should do?

I am wanting to train my cow to ride. He is a Holstein steer. Any ideas on what to use for a halter ? I use a cow rope now, but i cant figure out how to use one that i can control both sides of his head with. would a miniature horse nylon halter work? because then i could hook a lead rope with two hooks on both sides of the halter. thanks!

What is better to train to ride a steer or a heifer??