Asking for a friend who has a horse that recently developed headshaking. Has anyone tried the Tota Comfort noseband? It appears to be a relatively new product that is available from Dressage Connection.
Thanks in advance for everyone’s input.
I have one! I am using it on two horses one of whom headshakes. She does seem to be more comfortable with it on and less fussy about her head. It’s been a long time since she had a real episode, her shaking has reduced to just a few flips in the last year or so, but even those seem to be less with the nose band.
The other horse grinds his teeth, and he still grinds even in the noseband, it does not seem to have helped hm any.
YMMV.
MW
$350…was looking at the website to see if you could by a bridle with it, not yet. Just separately.
I borrowed one from a friend for my sensitive horse. He will fling his head down to rub on his leg when I’m riding him. With the tota noseband , this behavior stopped. I tired a different bridle and he still did it, I tried with a flash, and without a flash and he still did it. The tota noseband is the only thing that made a difference.
Interesting - I like the idea, but not for $300.
It is, essentially, very similar to the Micklem, which I do think some horses really like.
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To see if the head shaking is caused by the noseband, why not just ride with no noseband for a few days and see if that stops the problem? If he continues to head shake, the problem is elsewhere.
If it does stop the problem, you could introduce the old noseband after a week or two and see if he had forgotten the behavior. Or you could upgrade to the new bridle.
IME a cavesson noseband done up with the old-style rule of two fingers gap under it isn’t doing any real work in affecting how the horse goes, so it can easily be left off. I guess if you are currently using a crank, a very tight cavesson nose band, or a flash, that’s a different matter, and maybe altering those would also help.
I put one horse in a figure eight noseband because he was constantly yanking his child rider out of the saddle in his attempts to rub his face on his leg. It was quite successful in reducing the behaviour, and dressage legal.
Thanks to everyone who has posted. Very helpful to get different opinions.
It is out of my price range, unless I can find one used. Here is their face book and a great link from that page that explains TMJ and TMD, and how it affects the horse.
www.facebook.com/thedressageconnection/posts/1055270854507399
https://www.equinecraniosacral.com/articles/article2.html
Would this noseband be acceptable to show in?
Hello List. I am wondering if anyone has had experience with both the Tota Comfort dressage bridle and the PS of Sweden? Would love to read a review based on experience comparing the two. Thank you!!
You can use the Tota on trial, so very low risk.
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Interesting - my mare HAS to rub her face on her leg about 5 minutes into a ride.
I’ve been trying desperately to find some solution that will reduce poll pressure and be legal, and this claims to but I fail to see how it could. My horse goes much better in his Antares Precision bridle, but it is questionably legal due to a cutout at the poll. Can anyone explain to me how this noseband would somehow reduce poll pressure?
My honest answer? It kind of doesn’t. My other honest opinion is that this is just another hyper-padded noseband that helps people(g) keep the horse’s mouth shut but makes them(g) feel okay about how tight they strap the noseband because it is “ergonomic”. Obviously that is just a general statement and not directed in any way towards anyone in this thread.
You probably know this already, but the tightness of a noseband directly correlates to poll-pressure. If you have a loose noseband, unless you’re riding in a gag, there will be very minimal poll pressure at all, even with steady contact in the bit.
Tota’s angle is that instead the noseband reduces poll pressure by fixing the anchor-point of the bridle at a much lower point in the horse’s muzzle, similar to the Micklem. So the pressure is still there, it is just diverted into a different place (under the jaw & across bridge of the nose). The first strap/buckle of the Tota buckles much higher than in normal cavessons, which puts the cheek-pieces at a lower angle and bypasses (in a correctly fitted noseband) the TMJ pressure points.
It’s another interesting design but I haven’t seen it reduce pressure much. What it DOES do that a normal cavesson doesn’t is it does, when snug, ‘anchor’ to a horse’s face better - in a normal cavesson, when everything is fitted/snug, there’s pressure pulling from the poll downward, pressure from the poll to the bit, pressure on the nose from the noseband, and pressure from the tightness of the noseband "pulling’ the headstall down - in the Tota, the noseband seems to affix right along the cheek/nose area and seems to act independently from the headstall, which may be what they mean by “reduced poll pressure”, as in a normal headstall/cavesson combo, the cavesson always acts dependently to the headstall. Forgive my lack of clear enunciation, it’s early for me!
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