From: Anne
Hi Jessica! HORSE-SENSE has been very helpful to me and my horse, Blaze. I discovered you after I found out my horse had been abused by a previous owner, and therefore had scars that prevented the use of a bit. I then began frantically trying to find out anything I could about going 'bitless'. Though there is a lot of information out there, I'm still left with some questions. Blaze's trainer, once she discovered his scarred tongue, put him straight into the only hackamore she owned, a machanical hackamore with 8 in. shanks, braided leather noseband and leather chin strap. Even with my lack of hackamore knowledge, I was uncomfortable with this setup. I found as many other examples of unshanked hackamores as I could, and gave her the list with pictures and descriptions. She told me that my horse needed the control that the shanks offered, and that I had light enough hands that I didn't have to worry about all that potential leverage power. I asked her if maybe an English Jumping Hackamore might be okay, but was told it definately didn't have enough control for my horse. (She also switched him over to a rope halter for the same reason) After having several horrible visions of my horse stepping on his reins and breaking his nose, I've decided to switch to something less dangerous for him to wear when we start riding again in the spring. So, I've narrowed down my options to, English Jumping Hackamore or Western Sidepull. I've also come across something that looks good, but don't know anything about, a Scawbrig. Also, I'm not aware if this is actually an option or not, but at the end of your bit/bit fitting booklet, you show a rope halter, and I gathered that it too can be a bitless option. So.....
1. English Jumping Hackamore or Western Sidepull, which should I choose? Can I neck rein with them, or must I use direct reining? Can I put the jumping hack. on a western bridle, or only an english one? Also, how do these work? I'm especially confused on how they apply chin-groove pressure, which some Western Sidepulls claim to do.
2. Scawbrig, what is it? How does it work? Neck reining or direct reining?
3. Can I use his rope halter as a bitless option? How do I attach reins? Neck reining or direct reining? Would it be a good idea to try this first before I go buying anything?
4. Since control seems to be an issue (according to the trainer) is there a better option that I'm not looking at?
5. Any recommendations on where to purchase these items? (local 'farm stores' and tack shops only offer machanical hackamores)
Thanks so much Jessica. I want to do the right thing for this horse. He's had a rough 4 years of life, and I want to be able to keep him around so he never can end up back in a bad situation again.
Anne & Blaze
P.S.- Since this turned into so many questions, please feel free to edit out the less important ones.
You're right, there are a lot of options for a rider who doesn't want to or can't use a bit: halters, hackamores, sidepulls, bosals, vosals, and bitless bridles of various types. What you use is going to depend on what you want to do with it. What sort of riding do you want to do? You can neck-rein with just about any bridle or halter in the world, because neck-reining doesn't have much to do with the reins, and doesn't have anything at all to do with what's in the horse's mouth or around his nose and jaw. It has everything to do with rider balance, posture, and weight aids.
I'm disappointed and saddened by your trainer's response to your search for the right bridle. A mechanical hackamore with eight inch shanks creates a great deal of leverage and offers the rider no chance to be subtle in her communication with the horse. It DOES allow the rider to cause the horse a great deal of pain with very little effort - some long-shanked mechanical hackamores can break a horse's jaw - but the point of ANY bridle should be communication and GENTLE control, not pain and forceful control. Being able to direct your horse's feet and control his speed should depend on how well you communicate with him, NOT on how much you can hurt him. In any event, that attitude can - and usually does - backfire, because the bit or bridle that can potentially cause the most pain and damage is NOT necessarily going to be the best bit or bridle to help a rider CONTROL a horse. Horses can go out of control for many reasons, and extreme pain is high on that list of reasons. You may be able to stop a horse with a severe bridle, but breaking a horse's jaw or cutting its tongue is just as likely to send the horse into a frenzy of pain, at which point it isn't going to be under ANYONE's control. Obviously someone has already tried this with your horse - and just as obviously, it wasn't successful, because if cutting the horse's tongue with the bit had given the rider perfect, calm, easy control of the horse, the horse would probably not have been put up for sale...
So, in order:
1. English Jumping Hackamore or Western Sidepull, which should I choose? Can I neck rein with them, or must I use direct reining? Can I put the jumping hack. on a western bridle, or only an english one? Also, how do these work? I'm especially confused on how they apply chin-groove pressure, which some Western Sidepulls claim to do.
Both of these are really designed for direct reining, but there's no reason you couldn't neck-rein with either one, provided that you know how to neck-rein and that your reins are fairly heavy and substantial. You might be able to put the jumping hackamore on a western bridle - try it and see! As long as the noseband sits comfortably a couple of inches below the horse's cheekbone, and the lower strap can hang just below the horse's chin groove, you could probably use a piece of haystring for a headstall. ;-)
Neither an English jumping hackamore noseband nor a sidepull should create ANY chin-groove pressure, because neither one should produce any leverage whatsoever. If there are no shanks, and the reins are attached directly to rings on the sides of the horse's muzzle, on a level with his mouth, the chin strap shouldn't do anything at all. Some "hybrid" sidepulls include a bit - you definitely won't want one of those. I would prefer the jumping hackamore noseband over the sidepull, because many sidepulls are constructed in a way that places the cheekpieces high on the sides of the horse's head, and much too close to the horse's eyes.
Both a jumping hackamore noseband and a sidepull should work by direct pressure. Pressure on the reins will cause the jumping hackamore noseband to create pressure that's a little less strong than the pressure you would create if you had simply attached reins to an ordinary nylon or leather halter. Pressure on the reins will cause the sidepull to create pressure that's a little (or a lot, depending on the noseband) stronger than the pressure you would create if you were riding in an ordinary halter.
As for the claims - ignore them. Some day when you have nothing better to do, read through the bit section of just about any tack catalogue. Especially (but not exclusively) in the Western section, you'll find incredibly imaginative, creative copy describing every bit. This one "makes the horse light", that one "lifts the horse's shoulders", another one "lets you lift each shoulder separately", and then there are all of the bits that "make the horse respectful" or "create a great show headset". Ignore ALL of that - it's written by salesmen, not horsemen, and it's meant to SELL bits, not to describe them accurately. The world is full of bad bits. If the catalogue copy were truthful, many bits ought to be labeled "for the pub wall only, not for use on a live horse".
2. Scawbrig, what is it? How does it work? Neck reining or direct reining?
It's an old-fashioned (and quite effective) English version of a bitless bridle. You don't see them often, even in England, and in the last twenty years, I've only seen one in the States. But it's a very sensible, practical sort of bridle - with one significant drawback (more about this later). Pressure on the reins puts pressure on the horse's nose and lower jaw, so if you have a horse with scars from a bit on its tongue and scars on its nose from a mechanical hack or sidepull(the lariat-rope nosebands on many sidepulls are quite harsh), the scawbrig might be a very good solution. The only disadvantage I've seen with this bridle is, unfortunately, a fairly major disadvantage: unless the rings and the leather of the reins are kept extremely smooth and clean, the pressure on the horse's jaw may not release instantly when you relax your hand, and on some horses, due perhaps to the conformation of their heads, noses, and chin grooves, even smooth and clean rings and reins won't release the pressure when you release it at your end of the reins. Since the release is more important than the pressure, because it's the release, not the pressure, that teaches the horse, I'd probably have to advise against the scawbrig.
I don't normally recommend a bosal, because although a bosal can be very effective, proper use requires not just a hanger strap and reins, but a carefully-tied heel knot, a fiador, and a mecate, and you would need some expert help to learn how to (a) fasten and (b) adjust and (c) use those correctly. If you have an old bridle-horse trainer to advise you, then by all means talk to him about using a bosal.
Your control over your horse needs to come from training, and from your own posture. As you are no doubt reminded every time you look into your horse's mouth, it's not about the hardware. Just as your own mind is your most important piece of training equipment, the most important piece of horse-control equipment is not what wraps around your horse's nose or is fastened between his teeth, but what's between his EARS. THAT's the part you need to communicate with, and that's the part that allows you to control your horse.
3. Can I use his rope halter as a bitless option? How do I attach reins? Neck reining or direct reining? Would it be a good idea to try this first before I go buying anything?
You can use a rope halter as a bitless option - many people do. Some ride with a single rein, others attach the reins (or the other end of the long lead) just under the horse's jaw. The severity of the rope halter will depend on several factors: what sort of rope it's made of, and just how thin and/or harsh the rope is; where the knots are positioned, and how much pressure the knots create. Some people use a regular halter - leather or nylon - as a bitless bridle option. Don't count on any halter for subtlety - they're primarily useful for crude control.
4. Since control seems to be an issue (according to the trainer) is there a better option that I'm not looking at?
For good communication, good control, and a release that happens as soon as YOU relax the rein pressure, I would recommend the Bitless Bridle (www.bitlessbridle.com). This design is quite clever - instead of pulling the horse's head in the direction you want to go, it hugs the horse's head and pushes it into the direction you want to go. This is instantly comprehensible to horses, so there's no "learning curve" to deal with.
5. Any recommendations on where to purchase these items? (local 'farm stores' and tack shops only offer machanical hackamores)
Almost any Western tack catalogue will have sidepulls, bosals, and rope halters for sale (along with the usual umpteen pages of bits and mechanical hackamores). Almost any English tack catalogue will have a jumping hackamore noseband for sale. You might actually do best to look at some catalogues aimed at endurance riders, because those riders are very concerned with their horses' welfare, and a great many of them don't use bits at all. Thus, their catalogues tend to be full of useful alternatives such as halters, rope halters, and bitless bridles in various forms.
If I were you, I would begin with groundwork, and establish clear, GENTLE communication and control on the ground first. Then when you start your horse under saddle again, he'll have lovely manners, you'll have more confidence in each other, and you'll be in the habit of communicating without a lot of hardware. If you have any doubts, by all means start him in an enclosed arena where you can feel secure, and don't go out into the field or onto the trail until you feel quite secure about your communication and your horse's responses.
You might also consider joining an online group or mailing list for trail riders or endurance riders, because when you're being told that you can't possibly control your horse unless you use masses of hardware and/or leverage, it can be very helpful to be able to compare notes with people who have excellent control of their horses, generally don't use bits, and routinely ride for 50, 75, or 100 miles.
Jessica
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