Correcting the work of draw reins...

[dominobrown]

I am currently have a ride on a lovely dutch warmblood, very well bred about 17hh, and my god does he move!
However, all though he has been professionally produced and competing in young horse classes but has since been passed to yard to yard. As he is such a large moving type he has been ridden in draw reins until the cows comes home and probably rollkur as well to maybe try and control some of his exburance (however he is not nasty in anyway, no bucking or spinning or anything, just a huge really powerful horse), which has resulted in a very short and tense neck. When he is relaxed he does some lovely work, and has flying changes etc established but especially in the canter I find him very tense. Anyways... I am finding it difficult for him to work long and low and 'stretch' his neck, I know his more established so he has a more collected outline but as he has been ridden in draw reins so much it is not a correct outline if you take my meaning. Any ideas? He is ridden in a loose ring snaffle and flash and seems quite happy in the mouth.

 

[Jane_Lou]

We are having exactly the same issues with the mare we bought in February. She had previously show jumped and goes in a very tense short necked way. She is tracking up but not properly through and holds herself. We tried lunging in various aids but she just fixes against them. We have found that the only way to get her to release is lots of spiraling on a circle and shoulder in. It is still not perfect but its getting there! IWe have found she seels the contact forward best in a hanging cheek snaffle with a lozenge. This week we are starting a two week trial of riding her all the time in a de gogue which I had good results with with my old horse (also a former SJ turned dressage diva) she will school and hack in it and we will see if there is any inprovement. I am not a lover of 'gadgets' but this was one that was suggested to me by a very respected dressage trainer and list one judge that worked wonders! We have done 3 months of 'basics' before resorting to it so I will let you know how we get on. I am also desperate to try a Micklem Bridle as I have heard they are great with horses who won't take the contact forward but my budget won't stretch at the moment!

 

[dominobrown]

I have tried shoulder in and one rein it actually helps sometimes but he has to be in the right frame of mind for it, if tense it makes him worse! Its so annoying, he is the classic example of someone buying a big flashy horse and not being able to ride one side of it so resorting to draw reins etc. The person who backed and produced him apprantly did a brillant job but was then went to yards with people who couldnt ride him. Annoying! I will try a bit with a lozenge and see if that make any difference. Thanks

 

[Jane_Lou]

The other exercise that oddly works for us is that we ride 3 15m circles, so starting at say A ride 15m full circle, then change rein and ride another, then chance rein then another and then back down, we do that a couple of times and then do it with a 10m circle, so in the case of our arena, four circles, so not a serpentine, a definate circle then change, it seems to open her shoulder and we can get a lot more inside flexion which she then works down and forward to and keeping her off the track seems to help - does that make any sense at all?

 

[dominobrown]

Yes thank you for the suggestion, I will try that.

 

[Jane_Lou]

Let me know if it works and if you come up with any other ideas - its so frustrating, she can go so well and has lovely athletic paces, she is just so tense in her neck!

 

[Worried1]

Arthur came to us having been ridden in draw reins, it's been a long slow process to get him over this back and better in his neck, he still has a tendency to curl up when presented with scary or unusual situations but by and large he is much, much better.

We have worked on counter and true flexion on decreasing and increasing circles, this has really helped to unlock his neck and also encourages them to step through on their inside hind.

Lots of traver, renver and shoulder fore (shoulder-in can be a bit bold). This can be done on both long and short sides and the trck is not to stay in one for too long. By keeping them mobile and guessing it becomes harder for them to set against you. With any of the these exercises you have to offer regular breaks and be brave and allow the horse to stretch right down in the contact while keeping the trot or canter forwards and swinging.

Other things that have worked well are jump seat in walk, trot and canter then an uprighting of your seat followed by a slight lean back, this variation of your seat can really help to unlock backs.

 

[dominobrown]

Thaanks worried! Will try that tomorrow, very helpful

 

[kerilli]

^^^ loads of good ideas already. i'd add in contra-shoulder in in walk, making it really obvious where the open door is so that he realises he can really step across and loosen up, in walk only so no way to run off, worry, lose balance etc, and the wall/fence is there to stop him going forward so you don't have to use the reins.
of course getting the horse to trust the elastic/absorbing hand is SO difficult if they've been worked heavy-handedly in draw reins. i think this is the key, that absolutely consistent inside rein contact, that they gradually realise they can trust 100% at all times... but it is a long old process because you have having to overlay lots of negative experiences...
he sounds super and very worth it, good luck!

 

[ruth83]

Try taking the flash off.

Imagine someone is holding your mouth closed and try to relax your neck.

I'm not saying it will be a quick fix, or even that it will definately work, but it is certainly worth a try. Chances are that for the first 5 or 10 minutes he may go round with his head in the air gaping his mouth in a 'look what I can do now', novelty fashion, but most usually settle after this.

Often when I go to teach at riding clubs, dressage clinics or similar, people have problems with tense necks and horses not working over their backs. I pull them in, and whilst I'm chatting with them ask if we can try and experiment. Whilst we are discussing the work I quietly remove the flash whilst pretending to play with the horse so the rider doesn't notice. I then send them away for more work. 90% of the time I get an exclamation of 'that's amazing, how have we got this?' after a few minutes. I then show them the flash and ask why they ride in it. I usually get the answer 'He wore one when I bought him' or 'The bridle came with it'!!!

I'm not saying it is always the case, or that flashes do not work in some cases. Worth a try though.

 

[dominobrown]

Thanks for the suggestions.
RE; the flash, the last few times I have been doing it up fairly loose, infact so he can comfartably eat hay with it on but I will whip it off, maybe not tomorrow after his day off though

 

[TarrSteps]

Try taking the flash off.

Imagine someone is holding your mouth closed and try to relax your neck.

I'm not saying it will be a quick fix, or even that it will definately work, but it is certainly worth a try. Chances are that for the first 5 or 10 minutes he may go round with his head in the air gaping his mouth in a 'look what I can do now', novelty fashion, but most usually settle after this.

Often when I go to teach at riding clubs, dressage clinics or similar, people have problems with tense necks and horses not working over their backs. I pull them in, and whilst I'm chatting with them ask if we can try and experiment. Whilst we are discussing the work I quietly remove the flash whilst pretending to play with the horse so the rider doesn't notice. I then send them away for more work. 90% of the time I get an exclamation of 'that's amazing, how have we got this?' after a few minutes. I then show them the flash and ask why they ride in it. I usually get the answer 'He wore one when I bought him' or 'The bridle came with it'!!!

I'm not saying it is always the case, or that flashes do not work in some cases. Worth a try though.

You're nice, I just take the whole noseband off!

Lots of good ideas. I'd also add work in walk, getting the walk calm, even if it's a tiny bit underpowered (line forms on the right to slate me ) and a steady, soft contact, doing circles and QUIET changes of direction, setting a "limit" but not pulling back, just keeping the hand "there" until the horse trusts it a bit and starts to put some weight on it. When the horse softens the jaw, let the rein out slightly, if the connection gets lost just start again. Some horses are better if you start with a slightly shorter rein, but many are better if you start from a long rein and juuuust pick the contact up in the end, moving your hand wherever you need to to keep the steady contact. I find biiiig opening reins on circles helps a lot of horse, a few one way, slow quiet change, a few the other, until the neck starts to relax.

When the horse is getting the idea in walk and taking the hand down, add in a bit of trot. I usually come back to walk, rinse, repeat the first few times the horse comes off the contact, so it goes back to a safe place, then gradually start to ask a bit more on the fly.

 

[ruth83]

I loosen anything tighter than the standard 2 fingers!! If Carl Hester would like to come round and give me a full and thorough explanation of what else I should be doing with said fingers then he can crack on, but on most peoples horses, overtight nosebands do my nut in!!

(Carl Hester reference comes from his comment in the H&H a couple of weeks ago for those who don't read it)

 

[Baggybreeches]

I can't quote on my phone but the last paragraph of tarrsteps post is actually the way Pammy Hutton teaches young/green horses.
Just to add that it's not draw reins that are the problem, it's the misuse of them that cause the issues

 

[TarrSteps]

I can't quote on my phone but the last paragraph of tarrsteps post is actually the way Pammy Hutton teaches young/green horses.
Just to add that it's not draw reins that are the problem, it's the misuse of them that cause the issues

The opening rein thing? It's pretty standard but goes against what most schools of thought teach as "correct" at the most basic level, in terms of position, keeping the hands close together etc so it doesn't seem to get passed down to people who don't ride a lot of young/retraining horses. Western trainers use it a lot.

It's actually really hard, mentally, to get people to move their hands as needed to KEEP the contact, although it seems very easy for people to learn to move their hands to keep horse "off" the bit.

The hardest bit is teaching the horse to trust the hand again and just "be" on it. But horses like peace so most are keen to try it once you show them. Also bear in mind that the horse will have incorrect muscle development and likely cramp in its neck so will need time to adapt. It's probably worth having a physio out if you haven't already but, on a day to day basis, I find a good old fashioned curry comb is an important piece of kit!

 

[PooJay]

I bought a mare with very similar problems. Unfortunately i wasn't as experienced as a lot of people on here and struggled a lot for the first year! She's quite a tense and spooky mare as well and as soon as she gets tense or stressed we get the curled up rock hard neck back even now - it's default mode!

I didn't really get anywhere riding to start even if she was round, it was tense, btv and totally false. I worked a lot in hand and a lot on the lunge. No gadgets worked, pessoa she ran through and side reins she braced against - i didn't bother trying anything else and just stuck to work in the cavesson.

Lots of lateral work in hand helped, i mixed that up with loose jumping at the same time (engaged her with the lateral work in hand and then sent her forward over the jumps to try and get her to use her topline rather than reverting to just dragging herself along with the underside of her neck and forehand and rushing over jumps)

I also found lunging over poles, then sporadically raised poles and poles on a circle helped massively - grid work on the lunge too! Mostly because she had to stretch down and look at the poles to go over them and then she had a tendency to stretch down and swing after she'd done the jumping/poles.

My lunging obedience had to be spot on though - she isn't allowed to rush over the poles so she had to respond to commands to slllooooow down in the trot and properly step and bounce over the poles and use herself. If she rushes it's a wasted exercise. This really encourages stretchy work and relaxation in my girl - although at times she does have the tendency to cheat and trot along with her nose on the floor without working through correctly. This is still better than the upside down tense neck we had to start with as although she may be peanut pushing, at least her neck and mind is relaxed.

We still have moments of tension, any tense ride we have usually ends up in a couple of weeks of undoing so i have to be very careful how i ride - and not ride when i have pmt as i then have a tendency to be a bit uptight at those times It's very unforgiving but regular physio and bowen (for her and me), mixing up the work and lots of long neck hacking so we're not doing the same thing day in day out and making sure i have a happy and interested girl all helps.

Hope that helps, for me it was all about working on new muscle groups and undoing the old ones, massively difficult to start with but got easier over time as she learned to use different parts of her body. She was very oddly shaped when i bought her, no backside and a ginormous underside of her neck with no topline at all but she's looking very normal now and i'm very proud of my little cheeky black pudding named Pooj

 

[JGC]

Really good ideas here. Just wanted to add that like PJ, I found my mare needed lots of in-hand work and lungeing (I used the Kavalkade HO aid mostly) to get used to the idea of stretching without a rider first. Polework (lunge or ridden) can also get them stretching and looking down.

 

[TarrSteps]

Another option, especially if the horse is very fussy in the mouth, is to do some work in a hackamore (non-leverage). This can help a horse learn to trust the rider again and help start redirecting the physical development.

Bitting in general can be a big part of helping a horse like this. I'm generally NOT one for switching bits and expecting magic, but if a horse has not learned to trust the hand using something very soft and stable can make the work easier.

 

[twinpeaks]

lovely. I wish more people thought like you.

 

[Marydoll]

You're nice, I just take the whole noseband off!

Lots of good ideas. I'd also add work in walk, getting the walk calm, even if it's a tiny bit underpowered (line forms on the right to slate me ) and a steady, soft contact, doing circles and QUIET changes of direction, setting a "limit" but not pulling back, just keeping the hand "there" until the horse trusts it a bit and starts to put some weight on it. When the horse softens the jaw, let the rein out slightly, if the connection gets lost just start again. Some horses are better if you start with a slightly shorter rein, but many are better if you start from a long rein and juuuust pick the contact up in the end, moving your hand wherever you need to to keep the steady contact. I find biiiig opening reins on circles helps a lot of horse, a few one way, slow quiet change, a few the other, until the neck starts to relax.

When the horse is getting the idea in walk and taking the hand down, add in a bit of trot. I usually come back to walk, rinse, repeat the first few times the horse comes off the contact, so it goes back to a safe place, then gradually start to ask a bit more on the fly.

Agree with this 100%

 

[Marydoll]

Another option, especially if the horse is very fussy in the mouth, is to do some work in a hackamore (non-leverage). This can help a horse learn to trust the rider again and help start redirecting the physical development.

Bitting in general can be a big part of helping a horse like this. I'm generally NOT one for switching bits and expecting magic, but if a horse has not learned to trust the hand using something very soft and stable can make the work easier.

I like the wee flower hackamore you can adjust to how much or little leverage you want

 

[eatmoremincepies]

Great ideas esp ruth83 & Tarrsteps.

On a very basic level . . the technique that works well for me is to prompt the horse to release his jaw/chew the bit, then as he does, close the leg to ask him to surge forward and let him take the rein through the fingers. After 2 or 3 repetitions most will take the rein 4 or 5 inches, and stay the right way up for a couple of strides before inverting, at which point, gather up reins, release again and send forward again. Once this seems to be sinking in, don't need to slip the reins, just reward with a softening of the hand fo r a couple of strides.

To get the jaw release/chewing - obv noseband needs to be loose enough to allow this!! (Surprised at Carl H!) Either a big open rein as TS mentioned, until the jaw releases. Or lift inside rein & tickle corner of the mouth until you get a release. Or move the bit in the horse's mouth by moving your hands as a pair side to side a little - NOT backwards or fiddling. Or move the quarters over which often releases the jaw.

I find that doing this in walk and trot gives you the basic stretch into the rein/ good length of neck, in only a couple of sessions, which you can then work on maintaining through the figures/movements mentioned above - whereas just doing the figures/movements can take a very long time to have this effect.

Shall we start a noseband looseners clique . .

I am quite cruel and often put riders on the lunge with no reins or stirrups if they are having trouble getting a good length of neck, it's amazing how a tiny little hang on the reins can creep in and effectively tell the horse to keep his neck short. I know I've done it.

 

[I.M.N.]

This is a brilliant thread as I'm dealing with the same thing at the moment. I'm also recovering from a broken hip so can't really school full on as it were as I can only school for as long as the weaker leg can as I don't want my horse getting uneven from me, but there are a lot of little ideas I can try now and then progress to others as I get stronger.

(trying not to thread hijack but the Carl H reference is lost on me?)

 

[eatmoremincepies]

Carl H was in H&H a couple of weeks ago saying something about people not having their nosebands tight enough - most of the tight, short-necked horses I see go better with a looser noseband though. So not sure what that's all about.

 

[JessPickle]

Carl H was in H&H a couple of weeks ago saying something about people not having their nosebands tight enough - most of the tight, short-necked horses I see go better with a looser noseband though. So not sure what that's all about.

Perhaps he meant in the way people don't tighten the cavesson up enough, so then a flash noseband drags the noseband down the nose. It looks awful and can't be comfortable for the horse. I think its just the case of getting the balance right

 

[I.M.N.]

Carl H was in H&H a couple of weeks ago saying something about people not having their nosebands tight enough - most of the tight, short-necked horses I see go better with a looser noseband though. So not sure what that's all about.

I see, that seems like a bit of a dangerous comment as I would have thought far more can go wrong from a noseband that's too tight then one that is too loose.