12-Year-Old Amish Boy Killed in Farm Accident – While Discing A Field

Details are scarce, but a 12-year-old Amish boy was killed yesterday in St. Lawrence County, New York in an accident on an Amish farm. From WWNY:

TOWN OF DEKALB, New York (WWNY) – A 12-year-old Amish boy was killed in a farming accident in St. Lawrence County.

The sheriff’s office was called to a farm on Risley Road in the town of DeKalb on Wednesday.

Sheriff Patrick Engle said the boy was using a horse-drawn piece of equipment to disc a field when the accident happened.

The boy was pronounced dead at the scene.

That’s about all that has been reported. While tractors are present on some Amish farms, most Amish use horse power for their field work, typically hauling farm implements behind teams of draught horses, or in some communities (like Lancaster County), mules.

The boy here was described as “disc[ing] a field“. Here’s a Google AI summary of what discing is:

“Field discing, also known as disc harrowing, is a tillage practice that uses a disk harrow to break up soil, bury residue, and prepare a seedbed. It’s a common agricultural technique used to manage soil and control weeds.”

On many Amish farms, Amish children – mainly boys, but not only boys – operate horse-drawn equipment, commanding teams of horses or mules representing thousands of pounds of horsepower.

They learn such skills firsthand from a young age, by being around and learning from their fathers and older siblings.

This of course presents hazards, including from the machinery and the animals themselves. Amish life, and farm life in particular, has its own set of dangers that most non-Amish people and children do not have to deal with.

For example, last month, a two-year-old Amish girl was run over by a hay wagon in Missouri; thankfully she survived. Another toddler girl in Lancaster County was not so fortunate; she perished in a farm accident in March.

This happened in (I believe) one of the plainer Amish settlements in the county – St. Lawrence County is unusual in that it has six distinct Amish communities within its borders. If I’m not mistaken, Dekalb area would be part of the Heuvelton community, which is a Swartzentruber group.

Prayers for this family as they deal with this painful loss.