(dazzle-to blind or dim the vision by an excess of light)
Many, many times over the past few years I have faced Mia, the Arab mare I ride, with puddles. Like many Arabs Mia does not like crossing water. I have spent a lot of time coaxing Mia through these horrible puddles, and after some resistance Mia, the brave mare that she is, eventually crossed every puddle, and throughout the lesson she would improve. However let a few weeks go by without puddles and the next time out after it rained she would freeze up all over again.

Several weeks ago I used my Dr. Cook's bitless bridle on Mia. Worried that the noseband might irritate her molar teeth I put a Cashell cushion under the nosepiece of the bridle, which kept the rest of the noseband well away from her teeth. The riding arena was FULL of puddles that day and I went into the ring forseeing another day of coaxing her through the puddles. To Debbie's and my amazement Mia confidently strode through every puddle, not even hesitating once! AMAZING!!! Had Mia finally learned that puddles were a non-event in her life?

When I got home I got to thinking. I had sometimes thought about blindfolding Mia at every puddle (no, not really, just wishful thinking) and I had often wished that I could find polarized sun-glasses for her. And now, just by adding some bulk to the noseband the problem seemed to disappear. Then I reflected on how Arabian eyes tend to jut out from the head more than the eyes of other breeds, and it hit me. Maybe, just maybe, the nose-band cushion had blocked some of the ligtht reflecting upward from the puddle. Could it be that the reflection of the light on the puddle had dazzled Mia, blinding her and freezing her in her tracks? Could Arabians, because of their prominent eyes, get too much of the reflecting light in a sensitive place in their eyes, and then does that completely overwhelm the ability of their brain to process the incoming picture? That might explain how otherwise brave Arabians could be undone by the prospect of crossing water. It also made me appreciate Mia's bravery in proceeding through those puddles while blind, just because I wanted her to do so.

I had to wait for two weeks before it rained again. Thursday night the weather cooperated and it rained enough to leave quite a few puddles in Debbie's riding ring. I put the Cashell cusion under the noseband again and went out to ride. I was not expecting identical results because I was trying out a new thinner bit with my Micklem multibridle so the conditions were not identical. Mia was a little bit more leery about the puddles, but instead of stopping and freezing in place she just hesitated a split second and then strode through the puddles. Once she insisted on lowering her head so she could see the puddle better, but once she saw it she walked on through. No freezes, no balking, and while Mia was not happy with walking through the cold water there was none of the previous resistance to going bravely forward. I was happy with this, it meant that my solution worked even when Mia lowered her head to look closer at the water. The cushion still blocked the light enough so it did not overwhelm her.

Could this be a solution for all those Arabs who refuse to cross water? Are the Arabs refusing to cross water because the reflecting light is blinding them? I know that decades ago they used to use "shadow rolls" on the nosebands of some Thoroughbred and Standardbred racehorses. Could these race horses have been overcome by too much light coming into their eyes and adding a shadow roll fixed the problem? Questions, questions, and more questions that will probably never be answered, for just how can you ask a horse if the light blinds him? But right now I am seriously considering buying a shadow roll and putting it on the nosebands of every Arab I ride, using it when the ground is dry so that the horse can adapt to it, and using it when there are lots of puddles or other water to cross so that the Arab is no longer dazzled by the light.

Have a great ride!