My apologies for not posting last week, my internet connection was giving me fits.  All fixed now.

Why did I decide to change Tercel from the Spirit bitless bridle to a bit?  The last two times I rode Tercel in the bitless bridle I repeatedly got the feeling that Tercel was not getting the whole message from my aids.  Once I fixed his bolting problem with the D’yon blinkers I finally could truly feel how Tercel was reacting to my aids.  He has a pretty decent response to seat and leg aids, but I kept getting the feeling from my hand aids with the bitless bridle, that I could get him to respond to my seat and leg aids BETTER if only I could also influence his tongue.  I am not talking only about obedience here; I am talking about his movement, the quality of his relaxation, the smoothness of his transitions, and his mental “buy in” for doing what I was asking him to do.  But I had to fix his bolting/startling problem first because he was not able to concentrate on my hand aids when he obsessed on what was behind him, and I did not want to give his mouth a jolt when he had an unexpected meltdown.

Then I had to pick a bit (luckily I have a vast collection!)  Since I am so severely handicapped I like to use tack on the horses that announces that when I ride the “rules” are a little different.  I decided not to use my Mullen mouth snaffle because I want to educate his tongue, and that is a lot more difficult with a bit that does not move within his mouth.  Since he had always been ridden in three-piece snaffles I decided to try one of my center-jointed snaffles, either my JP Eggbutt Full Cheek snaffle or my Wellep bit.  I dithered for a little while and then decided to use the bit that the most sensitive mouthed horse I ride (Mia) approves of, the Wellep bit.  Since the Wellep effectively becomes a Mullen mouth when a heavier contact is used there is no extreme nut-cracker action to cause Tercel distress, because of the ball joints he can easily feel the motions of each hand, and he can put the mouthpiece where it is the most comfortable for him.

So two lessons ago I came out to the stable with Mia’s bridle and told Debbie that I wanted to try it on Tercel.  She agreed, so I got the D’yon blinkers from the Spirit bridle and put them on my Micklem bridle.  I was using my EZ-Fit treeless saddle since Tercel seems to move a little bit more freely under it than he did under the Abetta Western saddle.  Tercel was a little bit disgruntled about having the bit put into his mouth, but when Debbie got it in he did not seem to mind it.  By the time we got to the ring, with Debbie having to give him some corrections for barging ahead of her, he seemed to consider this bit a non-issue.

When I started walking him around on loose reins I noticed no distress on his part about having this bit in his mouth.  When I gently introduced contact he was completely fine with it all, reaching out confidently to the bit and giving nice, even contact.  Winding around the jumps in the ring using a lengthening of the outside rein as my hand aid, he kept even contact with both reins throughout the turn.  He kept his head where it should be for his present state of fitness and training (low with his nose poked forward) and Debbie told me she could see him playing with moving the mouthpiece with his tongue.  So far so good.  He even gave me some pretty decent turns on the hind quarters; at least he did when I got my act together and coordinated my aids properly!  The turns on the forehand were not very good, but they weren’t that good when using the bitless bridle.  It was only when I asked for a halt that all that happiness and light went away, he ignored the alternate twitching of my little fingers, he ignored my two handed mild hand aid, he ignored me when I “set” my hands, he finally slowed down somewhat when I pulled on his mouth, and he stopped only when Debbie told me how she uses her seat to stop him (stopping following his back with my seat, gripping a little with my upper thighs, and stiffening my hip joints.)  When I did that he finally stopped after a few more steps.  This was a problem I had NOT had with the Spirit bridle.

Then I tried to back up.  Hah!  After a few futile attempts to get him to go into reverse I asked Debbie to come up and give him a little shove back, then he backed up.  The next time I got him to go a step or two back without Debbie giving him a shove.  Again this is a problem I hadn’t had with the Spirit bridle though he was never really happy with backing up.

We went back to meandering around the jumps, and then one time, when we turned toward Debbie she said that Tercel had a “sleepy eye”, something she had never seen before when Tercel was ridden.  In spite of our misunderstandings about slowing down, halting and backing, Tercel kept calm about the Wellep bit and my contact with it so long as we were moving forward or turning, or even just standing still.  I just shrugged off my difficulties as Tercel not yet understanding my somewhat unusual use of the bit to give rein aids, something curable with just a little bit of further training.  Debbie started early in the lesson telling me how much she liked the way Tercel was reacting to this bit, how much better he was doing than with the other bits she had tried on him, and when I asked her if she wanted me to look for one on EBay for her she was VERY eager to get one for him (I looked for one, unfortunately the only one for sale right now is 4 ½”, a little bit too narrow for Tercel.)  When I asked her if I could continue to ride him in my Wellep bit she said yes.

This Wednesday when I got my lesson, Tercel was a little bit more resistant to me handling his ears though he eventually decided that me brushing his ears was a pleasure he was not willing to give up.  We got him all groomed, tacked up, and were half-way to the ring when I remembered that I had not put his blinkers on my bridle.  I walked back to the barn, got them off her bitless bridle, and we put them on in the ring, luckily these blinkers are really easy to put on the bridle!  This ride I was a little braver, I walked on the rail past the judge’s stand.  Tercel fixated on a bottle of water that someone had put on a fence post, getting himself physically set up to bolt when it appeared in the back corner of his eye, but once we got past it and it did not appear in the back corner of his eye he relaxed and it became a non-issue.  Again I got superb, even contact; again he turned readily to the outside rein lengthening, even when I did not also use my seat and legs to tell him to turn. 

Wednesday I had planned to teach Tercel my own sort of peculiar language with the bit, so for our first halt I first twitched my little fingers, first on the side where my hip was going down, release, then on the other side as my hip went down, release.  No response.  So then I made my hand aids a little more vehement, instead of just twitching my fingers I smoothly closed my hand then released, alternating like before.  No response.  I then smoothly closed both hands as his head went up with immediate release.  No response.  There was no response from his mouth when I fixed my hands either, and when I finally stopped following his back with my seat he finally halted.  Then I finally realized the reason Tercel did not react to my rein aids was because HE DID NOT UNDERSTAND THAT AIDS COULD BE GIVEN THROUGH THE BIT.  He understands that aids can be given through the Spirit bridle cross-under, but he has not yet transferred than knowledge to the action of the bit in his mouth.  I thought back, Debbie had told me that when she “broke” him to saddle she just got to work him one month.  When she ended up rescuing him years later she did not have much time to ride him so she turned him over to the barn’s dressage rider who rode him in a bit according to her school of dressage.  During that time Debbie started riding Tercel some, had problems with the bit, accepted my offer of my Spirit bitless bridle, and then trained Tercel to the aids with the Spirit bitless bridle.  Somehow, with all this riding, no one had explained to Tercel that movements of his bit really meant something.  Tercel was not disobeying the bit due to resistance, he was not disobeying the bit through bloody-mindedness; Tercel was not obeying the bit because no one had taught him that those little movements of the bit MEANT SOMETHING, and that he was supposed to “hear” the rein aid and obey it.  This can happen when a trainer concentrates on NOT using the bit to give the main aid, the aid the horse is supposed to obey, but uses their seat/legs as the main aid and just adds the rein aid as an afterthought.  Well, as I explained in my blog post “A Rule of Grammar” (barnmice.com/a-rule-of-grammar on March 21, 2010,) in order to teach a horse a new aid one must do the new aid first, then the old aid the horse already understands, then reward for obedience.  If the trainer gives the old aid first the horse understands the old aid as legitimate, but does not understand the new aid as an aid, it just becomes meaningless “noise.”  What I found out through my rides is that no one had taught Tercel that the bit was a legitimate aid because when he was ridden with a bit the rein aid always came last, and therefore was just noise, often irritating noise.

Well, a deep, deep hole in basic training for fine riding.  So we meandered around the ring a little more and I went through the same progression of the aids, finally halting, but this time when I fixed my hands I kept them fixed while he went through the possible responses.  Debbie was not completely happy with me since Tercel opened his mouth (remember, I don’t ride with a noseband,) but when he finally gave me a significant reduction in speed I promptly gave him the reins.  I was acting like a set of side reins to give him a chance to figure this bit pressure thingy all out.  He did not get terribly upset, he did not start flinging his head like he always did before when he did not like my hand aids.  Then we tried backing up and he eventually obeyed me and I gave him a really good neck scratch which he enjoyed thoroughly.  After a bit more walking I tried  halting again, and this time he indicated that he NOTICED the twitching of my fingers by slowing down a little bit, I went to the both hands, to the fixing of the hands and he stopped without me having to use my seat.  I sent him in to Debbie and got off.  I am sure he needs several days to think this through.  I’m just glad he “heard” the twitching of my little fingers as a legitimate aid instead of meaningless gobbledegook! 

I have noticed these past few decades that fine horsemanship has morphed from the idea that the rider HAS TO HAVE good hands to be considered a good rider, to the idea that only piss poor riders ever use their hands to give a hand aid except in an emergency.  Nowadays fine riders are only “allowed” to use their seat and legs to slow down and halt the horse, unless the rider uses the reins to give a “half halt”, often by giving the horse’s mouth a good, hard jerk (even in the Olympic dressage competitions,) not to give a slow down or halt aid but to “rebalance” the horse.  We can see the results with horses in dressage classes consistently behind the vertical, with the highest part of the horse being a third of the way down the neck.  To me, by what I was taught when I first started riding seriously 45 years ago, and by what I have read from the old Masters of Equitation, this is abusing the horse with the bit instead of teaching the horse how to respond properly to the bit by flexing his jaw and hopefully his poll.  Just my humble opinion, of course.

Have a great ride!    

Jackie Cochran

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