I have seen quite a few people use pvc pipe on the reins when hacking horses. I know this is a training technique. But does anyone know where this idea originated from, and what exactly it does? I am assuming its for horses that “get balled up” so they can’t curl up and evade the bit. Would love some more info… Im currently contemplating trying this out for a new horse, but would love to hear from someone who has tried it and knows of the effectiveness.
I tried it…it’s not for horses getting balled up- it’s not attached to the bit or their jaw to hold them off. Cannot remember what it was supposed to do, keep horse straight between the reins maybe? 30 years ago.
Didnt do anything but scare the filly into flying back into the arena wall and falling over. Call it a fail and one of the highlights of stooopid things I have done suggested by those who should know better.
Generally, don’t put anything rigid that won’t bend, break or give on a horse for any reason.
Never heard of doing this and I’ve had horses for 35+ years. Though it doesn’t surprise - some of the “training” techniques are interesting to say the least.
I agree with Findeight about putting anything rigid on that won’t give…
I’ve seen it done. Never tried it my self but I believe that it is for horses that bend too much in the neck. It’s supposedly to help the rider keep said horse straight.
what a strange concept! How about riding properly? 
[QUOTE=SendenHorse;7920096]
what a strange concept! How about riding properly? [/QUOTE]
Naah! If I can get from A to B in somewhat of a straight line, I must be riding properly. What?
The PVC pipes sound like a remarkable training tool.
Remarkable is a wonderful word, it does not imply approval. It does convey that it invites comment.
I am another who has never heard of this and I have been in the game for a long time.
[QUOTE=kalvyne1;7919556]
I have seen quite a few people use pvc pipe on the reins when hacking horses. I know this is a training technique. But does anyone know where this idea originated from, and what exactly it does? I am assuming its for horses that “get balled up” so they can’t curl up and evade the bit. Would love some more info… Im currently contemplating trying this out for a new horse, but would love to hear from someone who has tried it and knows of the effectiveness.[/QUOTE]
Yes I’ve heard of this technique from a hunter trainer. I did a clinic years ago (2005 or 2006?) with John Turner (Thumbs Up Farm from WA). He told me about using small PVC pipes on reins to keep the horse from getting behind the vertical. My eq/hunter horse at the time would occasionally get behind the vertical when he was soft (either that or he was grabbing the bit and running off, that was something we worked on in the clinic). I think it was John too who made me ride in his saddle (Tad Coffin) and regular steel stirrups (versus my jointed HS I was using at the time). Since then I’ve never ridden in jointed stirrups (could definitely feel the difference in my base of support over fences). Anyways, I’ve never used pvc pipes on reins or have never seen it done (but I’m not around a lot of hunter riders). I guess you would have to be pretty careful to adjust the length of the pvc pipe to corresponding length of horses neck and reins.
Think it’s kind of a west coast thing OP is from Cali, credo who has seen it from Wash State. I was in Texas when I tried it at the suggestion of a trainer recently moved from Cali. And that filly (age 3) was a regular wiggle worm under saddle so I bet it was supposedly for straightness.
Don’t do it. Not safe. Too much can go wrong, like getting a leg over it…and that exactly what happened. I went to put my foot in the stirrup (Western, got on from the ground back then) Poor filly shook her head, the pipes smacked into her neck, scared her, she went straight up, somehow got a leg over a reins before I could let go and get the hell away from her, the pipes smacked and rattled and she fell over sideways into the arena wall. Then the dam pipes slid off the reins in front of her when she was trying to get up, she was too scared to do anything but stand there shaking.
Yup, I sure showed my skill picking somebody to give me advice and training up a youngster there…
Funny the subject came up, brought back this nasty memory of the most spectacularly stoooopid, dumb as* stunt I ever pulled. I share because I don’t want anybody else to try it.
Long ago I ran into the technique of the rider IMAGINING that his/her reins were wooden poles instead of leather, of the rider moving his/her hands AS IF the reins were wooden poles whenever the rider wanted the horse to get his nose in front of verticle or to stretch the neck down. I still use this technique, it still works (using the leg too, of course), the horses tend to settle down and relax some.
It sounds like someone else may have read the same thing and decided to make the reins themselves stiff. Why bother? The imagining does just fine.
I have seen it done…even ridden in them. It was a long time ago and on ponies.
Millers uses to sell reins that were solid and would do the same thing. I have never seen them in person, just remember them being in their catalogue.
IMO … One of stupidest ideas ever !!!
Hazardous
Broken PVC pipes are like sharp daggers. I suppose if you desensitized the horse properly you won’t end up an arena pancake or having your horse break a leg trying to climb the gate on (his/her) way out ?
Ignorance 
Right up there with jumping horses over thin metal poles so they could skewer themselves like a shishkabob 
I have seen something similar done by a guy who claimed he rode reiners. He also filled empty milk jugs w/rocks & tied them to the skirt of his saddle - used a strand of fencing hot wire as his bosel (sp?).
Why not some PVC & maybe a bit of PVC pipe tied the outfit together ~
(Milk jugs, Hot wire, PVC pipe) ? Why not ?
I’ve never seen it done with PVC, but I have seen people use sections of those pool noodle toys before.
Gah! Now I’m going crazy trying to remember the name of the product. White PVC tubes with rubber on either end to keep them from sliding. Dover sold them in the 90s. Supposed to help keep the horse’s neck straight and teach you to keep your hands quiet. I remember thinking, “What a ridiculously dangerous idea.”
[QUOTE=Equitational;7920135]
Yes I’ve heard of this technique from a hunter trainer. I did a clinic years ago (2005 or 2006?) with John Turner (Thumbs Up Farm from WA). He told me about using small PVC pipes on reins to keep the horse from getting behind the vertical. [/QUOTE]
It was John that put them on my horse in a clinic, similar timeframe. I don’t think it was for the horse getting behind the vertical in that case, as that wouldn’t apply at all to that horse, but was, IIRC, more for me. I have a horrible habit of crossing my inside rein over the neck and I think it was for that. I also thought he got the idea from a particular BNT that he often got things like that from, but I won’t name the BNT as I might be remembering wrong!
I won’t debate the danger; I’m pretty risk adverse and don’t remember it being a big deal to me. I’m pretty sure that was my first clinic after coming back from a nasty fall that left me a total chicken, and my horse’s first clinic after rehabbing a suspensory, so I had a number of worries that day.:lol:
Its not a stupid idea. My trainer had me do it - once. It was to get it into my head, and to feel it in my hands, direct, straight, contact with the horse, and to see when he was over flexing on the bend, to get him straight. You could see when the reins were lying on the neck, see if your hand was crossing the withers. It was an eye opener when you just are’t getting it using your outside rein and inside rein correctly.
As I said, I only needed them once, in one lesson. My trainer used them on several of her students for the same reason, and I don’t think any of us needed them a second time. it was effective, and we got the point. Not a big deal, not magical, not to be overused. A good technique, for me and I finally got the idea of bending correctly, not letting his shoulder pop, and using the outside rein correctly, etc.
It was used at the walk and at the trot. There was no reason to use them in any other manner, it was to teach me to use the reins correctly.
I remember a rider using “steel reins” in a jumper class many years ago (maybe in the 1970’s). A California rider I think she was. The steel (not PVC) rod was clipped to the leather rein just back from the bit, and clipped again to the rein just before the hand. To help keep a horse straight, I think. Dunno how well it worked. Never felt the need to use something like this myself.
I can see value in the methodology, as what Ambitious Kate described (limited use to create a visual, sort of like when they put white tape on the horse’s shoulder to teach up downers their diagonals). That said, it still has to be safe. And any fixed rod does not meet that requirement. Extra bonus points for fixed rods that have the ability to eviscerate, maim and kill within the fairly predictable response pattern of a scared horse.
But what supershorty described sounds like a safe alternative to achieve the exact same teaching moment.
(and, um, if your horse is so behind the aids that you thnk this is a solution, that’s as good a sign as you will ever get that you need to rethink where your horse is at in his training and how effective the person training him actually is!)
I thought I would just add. ANYTHING you put on a horse, the horse must be going well in it before you add a rider.
Even a nose band. Some horses can go over backwards. Safety first and lunge the horse in anything new first. JMHO.
