Posted by Winding Down:
I cannot imagine training any horse without using any sort of correction ever.
:lol: something has to be communicated.
It doesn’t have to necessarily be thought of as a correction, or it can be, but more as a way of communicating what you want and what you expect.
Kind of like driving by Braille.
I agree with Poltroon on using transitions and on using an alternate releasing rein. You also can stroke the horse’s neck with your loose rein and pick it back up without any disruption.
so the OP has not responded on this thread. I am hoping that she/he has answered his/her question and has decided upon a bit that will work with her/hs training program. 
[QUOTE=Winding Down;8177364]
so the OP has not responded on this thread. I am hoping that she/he has answered his/her question and has decided upon a bit that will work with her/hs training program. :D[/QUOTE]
lol, this is the first time I’ve had the chance to read the thread since posting. Working nights as an ICU nurse means that for 72 hours a week I do absolutely nothing other than work,sleep, work repeat. This thread has a bunch of great training advice, which I appreciate and will be reading in depth later, although I was asking for bit choices that would make the training easier 
I do work with a trainer on a regular basis, and she has ridden my mare and agrees that mare lugs. She is also 6ft tall and has leverage on her side and does not find it as hard as my short legged 5’3" self to ride my 16.2 hh mare in a frame, but I digress. lol. I understand that more training/education is needed, and that is going to take time. I will be trying some thinner loose ring snaffles and such, to see if they might help me.
Thanks!
A few thoughts that echo some of the responses i did read, which is not all of them.
the horse has always been heavy and its only gotten worse with maturity. — this right here tells you that this is a riding and training issue. if you were doing something to teach the horse to carry itself better, it would not be getting worse with age.
your preoccupation with finding a bit that the continually-heavier-horse respects, is another red flag that this is a riding and training issue.
“At an end of some dressage lessons my arms are so tired from trying to hold her up/back that they have physically given out on me” — dressage should not be physically taxing in this way. if it is, then it is being taight incorrectly. you should not be fighting your horse or “holding it up.” this is completely counter-productive to achieving self carriage. every time you spend a lesson holding up your horse, you are teaching her “this is the way you are supposed to go, this is how you are ridden”.
to answer you question about a micklem, those were developed for fussy and sensitive horses, it removes pressure points. also fyi, the strap around the bit area is NOT intended to strap the mouth shut tightly.
My suggestion is to find a new trainer! sounds like yours does not teach you anything about how to improve your horse’s way of going. unfortunately there are a lot of theories out there, and a lot of them are not sympathetic to the horse or cohesive with the themes of classical dressage and self carriage.
food for thought, when you look at a professional riding upper level dressage looking light as a feather with unbelievably light contact on a horse who is moving effortlessly…how do you think they got that way? recognize that it is not SIMPLY that the horse is lovely and well bred. it is not SIMPLY that the professional rides well. it is, however, simply that they trained the horse to carry itself, from the ground up. they did not hit some point during training where they stopped fighting the animal and the animal started gracefully lofting around. they only train with a light touch. they school basics until the horse is ready to move on. it is never a fight.
You are 100% capable of retraining your horse to carry himself and get off your hands, but you need to do a lot of reading, find a trainer who is lovely and soft in the saddle and does not fight her horses. she/he should also recognize when the horse needs to be redirected so that you do not continue to school the same bad habits. You should also put that training level on hold… why are you pushing your horse when she cannot be soft at novice level? why are you encouraging the habits you already struggle with?
My apologies for laying it bare. I have a horse who was horribly ridden and trained by people who meant well. I am his 8th owner. it didnt matter how much pressure, what bit, what gadget was applied, he upped the ante every time. he became unrideable. it took nearly 10 months with me doing only walk trot transitions and poles before he willingly dropped his head and offered to go long and low for 2-3 strides (he was more complicated, he had responded to his bad riding by actually learning to go in a compensating manner, which added a thick layer to the “un-doing” process). no mystery here, but at the same time he gave me a true half-halt, sitting on his butt and holding his engine without shortening his steps. it has taken almost 3 years (3 years this august!) to get true self carriage. we did and do A LOT of transitions. a lot of walking over raised poles. a lot of backing up to reset his hindquarters. a lot of long and low until he could maintain his pace by himself. all this every day. i cant expect him to accept contact correctly if he cant carry himself off contact. i focused on basics and as they improved, doors opened for us. training became easier and movements do not need to be forced.
I urge you to seek other methods and re-think your goals and expectations of this animal. It was very frustrating for me when, 2 months into work after purchasing my boy, i realized just how swiss cheese he was. how badly he needed basics and how long he’d need to work to become even base-level competent. only once we could work off elementary control could we even consider progressing to more challenging stuff.
it pays off and it is the right thing to do, it is good horsemanship. good luck!
[QUOTE=BaroquePony;8174504]
I wouldn’t go to the thinner mouthpiece. I would learn to sit and then ask your horse to lighten up with a good sharp bump to the mouth (using one hand will do it) (preferably in a nice French link mild snaffle or something similar) … but then you immediately need to keep things light after that or you are not rewarding your horse for taking the hint and getting lighter in your hands. By not going to a thinner bit you are being more humane about the situation when you have to bump your horse’s head up … ride forward as soon as you do this and you must lighten up your hands (rein contact) immediately afterward …
They don’t pull unless you are asking for too much with your hands. Now you need to correct this and learn to use your hands less and your legs and seat more.[/QUOTE]
Very much agree with BP here - and I can locate a snip of a dressage lesson with my horse to demonstrate (using it both to lift her head, then bump her forward off my leg, to get her both lighter in my hand and to rotate her croup). Obviously, this has a lot to do with timing (for me its HALF HALT HALF HALT - which brings her head up, followed IMMEDIATELY by a BUMP BUMP with my leg to send her forward - and make sure she doesn’t hit my hand with her mouth as she goes forward).
Anyhoo, I always find the answers “don’t pull” because that’s not super helpful. Yeah I get it don’t pull - so what, let my reins loose? go long and low? no…
Horse needs to be forward in front of leg, too, before the half halt/bump forward move will work. When reschooling my horse I spent several weeks of going forward, changing directions and reinforcing forward. Send forward, take leg off, quick punishment if horse slows when leg is off. After horse associates forward when leg is on, than you can progress further.
And finally, a last suggestion - find a good bit that your horse respects (3 ring gag, for instance) and school horse in bit before the show and make horse very light in the bridle, when you switch to show bridle for the show, horse will still be schooled and lighter in the bridle.
so forward first, and off the leg, than work on hanging on the reins and half halts.
[QUOTE=chestnutwithchrome;8177720]
lol, this is the first time I’ve had the chance to read the thread since posting. Working nights as an ICU nurse means that for 72 hours a week I do absolutely nothing other than work,sleep, work repeat. This thread has a bunch of great training advice, which I appreciate and will be reading in depth later, although I was asking for bit choices that would make the training easier
I do work with a trainer on a regular basis, and she has ridden my mare and agrees that mare lugs. She is also 6ft tall and has leverage on her side and does not find it as hard as my short legged 5’3" self to ride my 16.2 hh mare in a frame, but I digress. lol. I understand that more training/education is needed, and that is going to take time. I will be trying some thinner loose ring snaffles and such, to see if they might help me.
Thanks![/QUOTE]
Sounds like a plan! Training and accessing the tool box is what is all about!
Here is the Myler Bit that I find provides an nice switch from the fatter bits - my guys tend to go very very lightly in this bit, with not enough pressure (as in 2 lbs or less per hand).
http://www.amirashop.co.uk/acatalog/(2802)-Loose-Ring-French-Li.jpg
Also, you will find that as the horse progresses up the levels to more collection, the lbs pressure will likely increase but that should come later and not so early.
Looking forward to reading a progress report!
here is a snip of a lesson i had in January. At this point I had already worked a ton on going forward off my leg (outside of lessons). As far as this particular ride, this is about 15 mins into the lesson, already have warmed up and then spent a few minutes going forward off my leg. From this lesson we progressed into doing some lateral-type work, spiral in and out, haunches in on a cirlce and last lesson we did some half pass work on a circle (spiral in, bend to outside and spiral out). Here is bumping her face up and kicking her forward (I wish I could find a better example as I have one somewhere when we first started doing it at the canter). Lateral work helped also with lifting her frame up - but again you can’t jump to lateral work without the foundation of forward and not pulling down
also in this lesson I was riding on the snaffle rein of a rubber bar gag. I had been using the gag with both reins for jumping to try and resolve the pulling down and being heavy habit. From this bit I transferred into a boucher, which she really likes
OP, changing the bit and bridle can be essential to your retraining process, so it’s a great question to ask. Many horses who are chronic pullers have numbness or nerve degeneration around their bars and tongue, which is why it’s so easy for them to hang out there. In order to find connection to your horse’s mouth again, you do have to adjust this so that the horse can really feel you. That means changing the action of the bit and where it sits. The gag bit has a lot of poll action (the baucher does not, btw - no leverage) which is why you’ve probably had success, but even a bit that changes the placement of the action (ie more tongue action instead of bar action or vice versa) can help. You’ve said you’ve played with this a lot over the years, so unfortunately you might have used up these options to some degree. However, moving the bit up or down in the bridle may help. Most people have the bit on the high side, so lowering it a hole or two (you can go down to no mouth wrinkles, but just make sure you’re not hitting teeth) may bring it into contact with more sensitive tissue. Even trying something a bit off the wall, like a kineton noseband, will also shape how the bit affects the horse by distributing some of the pressure to the bridle. Bit down in severity, not up, when trying this, because she may have totally different reactions than you’re used to, and you don’t want to ruin this part of her mouth.
CAUTIONS: That said, she’s getting worse and you don’t have many more places to go with this because you’re already in a really harsh bit. So, if you’re not willing to really take the time to step back and lay a new foundation for this horse by re-training her, don’t do it. You’ll just end up souring her to poll pressure and have a back-sore, curling horse. If you want and are ready to make this journey, which may mean adjusting your competition schedule, then you need to go back to the source of the problem - correct fitness and muscle. What people often mistake for laziness in horses usually derives from a physical inability to do what is being asked. Yes, the laziness plays in - that’s why you’ve got a puller and not a rearer - but the problem usually stems from more than “she just won’t go forward or use her hind end.” She probably was not given the time to properly develop these muscles so that she COULD use them, and when her strength gave out, she started to lean on the reins.
If you’ve ever heard a fitness instructor talk about working until you can’t “keep form,” it’s the same for horses. Only they can’t tell us they’re tired, so they modify their body to an incorrect result to try to comply with the request (it’s not like they want to get kicked or swatted). Then they build muscle around the incorrect result (aka pulling) and “it gets worse over time.”
Even if you’re riding her regularly, that doesn’t mean she’s strong enough to carry her own weight and rock back onto her haunches. Just like a runner can’t necessarily do chin-ups, your horse can’t necessarily do dressage just because she’s fit to jump. So, if you want to really solve this, do change the bit, and then spend a couple months building her up from behind. Do it slooooowwwwly - she will only be able to hold herself for a few seconds at first. I would suggest using caveletti once or twice a week to build that muscle and teach her to hold herself. Ingrid Klimke has a DVD set about this so you can do it properly without rushing. You can have a nice, soft rein, and it’s a totally different dynamic than “dressage.” Plus she will only have to work for a short burst before she can rest, and that is how you actually build muscle. Body builders do reps, not just holding up weights, because muscle is built by moving between extension, contraction, and relaxation. Be conscious of this in all that you’re asking her to do, and praise like crazy when she does engage even for a little bit.
Then, in a few months when you have a horse who can actually comply with your request, you can begin to worry about pulling it all together. Don’t even think about the head before that. Best of luck to you!
Lots of good advice here, and I especially like TB or not TB?'s post above. I will just add that some horses pull/hang with a bit that is uncomfortable for their mouth shape, which is not an effect that seems intuitive to us perhaps. My older mare was like this; I finally found that the Myler comfort snaffle (with the barrel in the middle and kind of an angled port to give her tongue relief) was very comfortable for her and very mild, and she instantly went more lightly in it. She had a very fat tongue and low palate, and even a curved flat French link was causing discomfort.
I will also note that, in my limited experience, many horses hang/lean on the flat when they are not strong enough to engage their cores and hind ends and really carry themselves. If you can teach them that leg means “engage hind” + “lift belly/back” then you can gradually make them stronger in the correct way. This takes time, though. Work over cavaletti and up hills can really help, too. If it feels like she really can’t travel lightly without lots of help from a strong bit, I’d ask your vet to look at her hocks and her SI.
Of my heavy in the bridle horse, my dressage trainer (who is also a judge btw) used to say, try to ride her above the bit, because she’s not going to stay there.
I just got a new guy and he has been sitting for quite some time. He is a very similar feel to my last (heavyish) mare, but also forward and quick. He leans down and runs forward on the bit because he is not balanced. It feels counter intuitive, but the fix is to add more leg and not give him anything to lean on. If I take hold if his face, he’ll grab right back and run into it. Let him go and put on leg, and he has to slow down and pick himself up to balance. Fortunately he’s gaining strength and is much more consistent after three weeks back in work!
[QUOTE=beowulf;8174520]
Both GFAG & YB have points… you can’t win tug of war with a horse and if you don’t feed into her pulling she can’t play that game.
If she is pulling you out of the saddle @ the canter, honestly, put her in some side reins until she learns she is only pulling against herself. I had one good trainer who used to teach me on a client’s horse, client’s horse was very, very heavy in the bridle and I wanted to work on my independent seat – so she would put the horse in side reins and put us both on the lunge… a big NO-NO in America, but a basic in many european programs. We worked on lots of transitions, and lots of GO. Put yourself on the lunge and have your trainer video-tape you - chances are you are using too much of your hand because either you feel her movement is too big or you have not developed an independent seat yet…[/QUOTE]
Wherever did you get the notion that longeing a student in side reins was a big NO NO in the US? The USDF has a protocol for this and it is something on which instructor candidates are tested. I have used this for years, and the last I knew, I was still in the US.
It is correct that horses such as this need to be educated to ride from the seat and leg, as does the rider. From a rider’s viewpoint though, it is a lot more physical organizing and work than going to a stronger bit. There fore we have a world with many bits.
OP, if you are still with us, here is a quick thought. Sometimes heavy in the bridle can be due to discomfort in the hindend. Have you flexed her to check for hock/stifle soreness? I cannot believe I did not think of this at the outset as this is pretty much par for the course in symptoms of soreness behind.
I think I was so focused on the bit question. TB or not TB has great ideas. And I agree not every horse goes well in the same bit or bridle configuration. I have just discovered that one of my young horses is far better in a standard cavesson with flash than he is in a Micklem. And he used to go better in the latter. Changing things up and experimenting with alternatives is essential to good training.
Sometimes training is a single subject research design!
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