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Horse Drawn Curbside Trash & Recycling

Just one of the teams you will see on the job with Pat and Nick collecting garbage and recycling!
photo by Pat Palmer
Just one of the teams you will see on the job with Pat and Nick collecting garbage and recycling!

Tuesday March 24, 2015

By Cookie Steponaitis

There was a time when the traffic on the roads of Addison County moved at a different speed and the sounds of the clip-clop of shod hooves and the jungles of the harness and bridles were the rhythm of the day. While that might sound a bit old-fashioned and a part of Vermont past, it is in fact still a part of Vermont present and Vermont’s future.
    For the past seventeen years, Pat and Cathy Palmer have been operating a horse drawn trash and recycling business in Bristol and have become a common site on the streets of town on Saturdays. It was 1981 when Pat Palmer picked up an old copy of a Draft Horse Journal and read about a man in Oregon who ran a trash route in the summer. Approaching then Bristol Town manager Bob Hall, Palmer found the town intrigued by the possibility. For the thirty years leading up to that the town crews had done recycling and Palmer was one of three bids for the contract. Well known in the draft horse community, Palmer’s team of Percherons Jake and Jerry pull carriages for weddings, provide rides at county celebrations, pull logs, mow, rake and chop hay, and have appeared all over New England in both contests and shows.  Bred to work and pull, draft horses are gentle giants who are happiest when they are at work.
    Entering into the business with Pat Palmer and expanding it to the Middlebury area is Nick Hammond. A draft horse enthusiast who has spent most of his life with horses, Hammond and his team Pete and Paul are not only joining in, but adding strength and the ability to expand. Service will begin on Mondays and Tuesdays in early April. How the service works is people purchase Trash Bag Sticker @ $ 5.00 a piece directly from either of the men. As the route expands in Middlebury more sites and secure locations will be added around town for the patron’s convenience. All trash and recycling bags should be 30 gallons in size and carried to the curb. Weight should not exceed 50 pounds. All trash bags must have one Trash Bag Sticker on it and recycling should be in clear plastic bags marked recycling. All bags should be tied shut.
    Rounding out the crew is Amanda Morse, who has been under the tutelage of Pat Palmer for as long as she can remember. Whether it is driving, riding or working with horses, Amanda started helping out herself on the Bristol route when she was about in her teens. Like Palmer and Hammond, Morse possesses not only a deep love of draft horses, but sees the advantages to offering Vermonters not only a choice, but a connection to their agrarian roots. Horses are in fact quiet, cause no air pollution, are environmentally sound and will never make people face a fuel surcharge. Most importantly, horses are a passion shared by not only Palmer, Morse and Hammond, but Hammond’s little daughter Eleanor, who rides her horse Cruiser and has already started to take the reins with her dad of the draft team.
    Interested people who want more information or to sign up should call Pat Palmer at (802) 377-0921, or (802) 388-6232. People can also reach Nick Hammond at (802) 349-4067 or by emailing them at [email protected]


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