I meant use shots and Coggins (and be willing to give up your credit card number) to establish that relationship with a vet practice. In my area, if your established vet isn’t available for an emergency, they’ll try to find another vet; if one vet can say you’ll pay your bills, that goes a long way towards having another vet step in. (Speaking of which… it’s been in the 50s and 70s and raining all day. Now we have howling winds and a drop to freezing coming. Poor vets will be busy…)
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That was my thought as well. Not owning a horse anymore really is peace of mind, sometimes…
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Would this not have the effect of all horses having light, educated mouths so that the use of the double bridle, even by you, would be entirely unnecessary?
I’m not disagreeing that banning double bridges seems like overkill, just suggesting that you have a conflict in your points.
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Could you give me suggestions as to how I cultivate a relationship with my vet? Unless I am paying to see him, ie have a horse that needs to be looked at, and perhaps a Christmas card, how do I see him?
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I think quietann was referencing the Vet Corner Facebook page where people post looking for help from vets. I also have a bit less sympathy for someone reaching out for free help on the internet when they’ve neglected to get the basics like Coggins/rabies/teeth check done and therefore don’t have a business relationship with a vet. A lot of practices won’t do emergency farm calls for non-clients, and a lot of those posters say they can’t/aren’t willing to haul.
Essentially if you(g) decide to be cheap/not do your homework and get that yearly checkup to establish yourself as a paying customer, I’m sorry for the horse but not so much for you. Even a cattle or pig vet can administer shots and pull Coggins - they do it all the time actually. If you can’t get that covered I don’t think you should own a horse. (Don’t get me started on small animals…)
Idk I think that a lot of those situations are a case of the owner not doing any “calling all the vets in the area” and just going to FB/Google. And then getting mad when the answer is “get a vet. And pay for diagnostics”.
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Back when I had healthy horses that didn’t need a vet often I had to do “Wellness Exams” once a year to remain a client. Vets policy was if they didn’t see you once in a 12 month period they would drop you and not come out for emergencies. It worked out ok for me cause coggins and vax, but some were not happy with the policy
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My vet has the same policy.
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I think the idea is that in educated, soft hands, adding a curb allows a level of refinement that is much more difficult to get in a snaffle. If you compare some of the older examples of dressage riders to today’s, you’ll see the curb perpendicular to the ground and often with a slightly draped rein in the older ones, while modern examples get a lot of riders who are heavy on the curb so it’s pointing back towards the rider with very tight reins. This includes those at the top of the competitive sport. The usual justification is about how big and powerful modern WBs are, so one “needs” the tightness on the curb to control them.
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Well… You call local vets up. You ask if they are taking new clients, and what is required to become a client. It’s helpful to have someone to vouch for you - say, your previous vet, a trainer, a major client of the vet practice you’re trying to get into, but it’s not necessary.
Or you move into a boarding barn and piggyback on whatever vet or vets they are using. This is usually how I have done it.
My current vet requires that you have them out for a “well horse” exam, if the horse is up to date on its vaccines, and that you give them a credit card number and permission to charge your bills to it. They waived the former in my case as I’d been a client several years before, and they knew my horse.
For the mare I have who is boarded in Michigan with her breeder, she is seen by the vet who sees all the breeder’s horses. That vet is officially not taking new clients, but because Lola is boarded with a major client, they just wanted a credit card number from me.
My post was a response to Jackie, who said she uses a curb because she doesn’t get the unhappy/evasive/locking up reactions from the horses who have previously shown issues with bit/rein aids, and so curb bits shouldn’t be banned. She then said that all riders should be trained to be light on horses’ mouths.
My post was simply pointing out that the second point negates the need for the curb as raised in the first point. It is human nature to dismiss the entirety of someone’s comments if they find a single thing that is false, or contradictory, or other flaw. Avoiding such issues allows reasoning to be heard and assessed for its own merits.
This is what I was wondering.
It’s not like this is some non-competitive country where a ban like this would change nothing.
This would have major international impact… either eliminating all the riders from one of the most dominant dressage countries, or forcing them to move…
…or could it cause a ripple effect across Europe that the FEI would have to address?
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Ok, I don’t get what you’re trying to say at all. Are you criticizing me,or Jackie, or both.of us? Jackie has MS and has found that horses go better for her in a curb. It’s possible that the lighter contact in a curb is easier for her to maintain.
For a non-competing rider, trying to squeeze oneself into the “must use a snaffle” box can be counterproductive. Once I decided not to compete anymore, I felt more free to experiment with different tack. Before my right hand got so messed up, I was noodling around with a short shanked Pelham with my mare’s preferred double jointed mouthpiece using double reins and very light contact on the “curb” rein. I can’t do double reins anymore, so went back to a snaffle, and eventually a little S hackamore.
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Rereading, you already have an established relationship with a vet, right? You don’t need to do anything more. It’s the people who don’t, and haven’t tried, and then get into trouble with their horses that I was talking about.
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I think that is a very fair policy for a vet to have!
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I am not RedHorses, clearly, but I read their post to not be criticizing either of you, simply making the point that the way it was explained in Jackie’s post solution B would negate comment A so using that logic would make the double not required. (Curb is good to be for a horse that is evasive with aids is comment A, solution B is all people should be taught to ride with light hands.)
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I have no empathy for those individuals that bitch and moan and blame everything on the vet… then publicly accuse over Facebook them of not caring because said vet won’t (or couldn’t) attend their horse on Christmas Day when the horse had been dying for a week, and the owner has a massive outstanding bill with that vet…
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No, the second point in no way negates the first. If you have never ridden a horse was happier in the double than in the snaffle, you will not understand Jackie’s point. Every rider can be educated to have and use the lightest hands possible, snaffle or curb notwithstanding. With a few outlying exceptions, horses should at the very least accept the curb when it’s ridden with educated hands. It’s no more nefarious than, and just as much a refinement as spurs.
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As I posted earlier, I am not criticizing the use of the double or curb. Nor am I attacking Jackie or @quietann (as she suggested).
If all riders were educated to ride with light hands, there wouldn’t be a need for any equipment to counter behaviour that has been learned to counter hard hands.
Had Jackie instead suggested that she finds the curb allows horses to be more forgiving of her MS induced instability in her end of the contact, that becomes a completely separate point.
Saying you can’t ban the often misused X because I personally like it to fix Y, and Z should be mandated so that Y never happens is a contradiction.
I see trubandloki understood my point.
Whether or not I understand the subtleties of using the curb is irrelevant. Whether or not I support banning curb bits is irrelevant. Whether or not Jackie or quietann or you enjoy riding with a curb is irrelevant. The structure of the argument is the point.
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These aren’t necessarily the ones I’m talking about.
-“My horse got turned out on a summer pasture in May, and I went to go see her in August and there’s a giant gash on her leg. What should I do?” CALL THE VET, WHEN IT HAPPENED. (think - this horse hasn’t had eyes or hands on it in MONTHS. No foot care, no preventative care, nothing… the pasture had a creek through it and I guess enough grass to sustain weight, but come on…)
-“A week ago my horse came in with a goopy eye. I’ve been putting furazone in it and it’s just getting worse. The horse doesn’t want me to touch it. What should I do?” CALL THE VET, AND THROW AWAY THE FURAZONE.
-“My horse is colicing. I have no banamine on hand and the nearest vet is on Pluto. Is there anything I can do?” OMGGGGGG
I just can’t. Some people REALLY shouldn’t own animals.
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Some horses just don’t like the effect of the snaffle-even if it’s a Mullen mouth with no bending action. They want a feeling of the curb chain. Additionally each bit has a different action/results in different changes in the horses body position.
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