Rant! - why do people over tack their horses!!!

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Sunny08

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This is my quick rant. Why do people over tack and over bridle their horses, especially at shows! Why do people think that they can compensate for training and schooling with heavy bits, ridiculous nosebands, whips, spurs and generally awful riding. Why can't they go home get the basics right and then ride thier poor mounts softly! Sorry follows an awful experience at a local show yesterday!

BTW this isn't a criticism against people who use complicated tack properly just a rant at seeing children riding ponies in double bridles with no idea how to use them, bits and nosebands which strap down the pony or horses head, and an obvious lack of basic schooling!
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Or kids in drawreins!
There was also a girl at our yard who used to strap her mare down in a market harbourgh and just canter it round and round the school. How is that schooling, or teaching it anything??
I'm a bit of a 'snaffle and legs' person myself, not big on gadgets, although I do have a wilkie and martingale for jumping. That, for me, is serious gadgetry!
 
Completely agree I can't stand going to local shows some of the things you see make me really sad. No one seems to want to school correctly any more they just look fora short cut i.e bits or gadgets.
 
Agree my horse is schooled in a snaffle bridle and a GP saddle and little else!!! Sometimes if I am really pushing the boat out gadget wise I will carry a schooling whip!

Seriously though I don't have anything against gadgets if used absolutely properly - not something i choose to do but can see the arguement for - it is people using them inappropriately which drives me mad!
 
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I do it purely to give people on forums something to talk about
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Hehehe bait swallowed!
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This is a pet hate of mine.
I know a girl who bought a pony. I actually tried the pony twice, loved him and thought of this girl for the pony because he was an ideal first pony. He was a lovely snaffle mouth, cavesson noseband, went down and round beautifully, bombproof and push button.
She bought him and then the RI put him in a gag because the girl couldn't ride him properly
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Well teach her you numpty instead of letting her saw at the pony's mouth in a GAG!!! I rode him 2months later and he was ruined
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Usually (in the cases that you have no doubt experienced....which I can pretty much imagine
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) because there parents don't have a dolly blue neither, or have been mis-informed by other so called experts, its like an infectious disease.

I was at a local SJ yard a few years ago and they were teaching a young girl to jump, canter over small fences, poor little thing swinging on for dear life onto the poor little pony's mouth....again wick little welsh, obviously needed schooling, more apparatus on the pony thatn you care to imagine, too strong for the jockey and yet the little girl couldn't even rise to the trot properly.....it was complete mish mash in all areas.

Parents have more money than sense, yard owners don't give a monkeys because at the end of the day, there still getting paid have have just sold them a flash little jumping pony for ££££'s ....well I like to call it stupid money, it's always happened and always will.
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i use the bare minimum myself but am always interested to see what other people are using and whats in vogue

currently here every horse is required to wear a 3ring bit a very tight martingale, flash boots all round and 4 over-reach boots

was talking to a friend this week and noticed her flash noseband was incredibly tight, she must have had to do some serious hauling!
 
There's a pony at our local RC shows, jumps in Market Harborough, flash and standing martingale attached to cavesson. And they wonder why it jumps with a hollow back and gets poles down
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my horse is in a snaffle bit, cavesson noseband and a running martingale. And a standing for hacking.

There definately is a current trend for 3 ring bits!

my RI teaches me to ride through problems, not cover them up.

result is I ride a lot better than I ever have, and my horse is a joy to be around. she can be difficult but by learning to ride we are both coming on in leaps and bounds.
 
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I'm old school me......snaffle with lozenge, plain noseband. No flash/martingale/side reins etc etc.

Frankly...theres less faffing and less to clean.

Brushing boots are enough for me to be messing around with
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I'm the same - except I can't even be arsed with the boots.....!!!
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I saw a pony at the Sj at our yard one week in a pelham and double reins. The boy would crack the pony on the ar*e with the whip before each jump the haul the pony in the mouth
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Poor thing didn't know weather it was coming or going.
 
i had a horse which i sold on, his name was harvey and i sent him off to be proffesionally sj schooled, he came back in a snaffle and a martingale- not why sure martingale but it was loose. well i just sat on him and he went on the bit, walk, trot, canter and even gallop on the bit. loved it. went on holiday for a couple of weeks and when i came back he was in dutch gag with flash on the tightest hole and a comleatly differant saddle and a harbridge. last time i let anyone else ride him!. well i reschooled in just a simple loose ring snaffle and he turned out lovely again
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all the bling we had was his browband. was offered £5000 but didnt except. money came short so sold to a friend who i see daily and she has kept him simple lursh, i only sold him for £2500 but its the best thing i done.
 
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There's a pony at our local RC shows, jumps in Market Harborough, flash and standing martingale attached to cavesson. And they wonder why it jumps with a hollow back and gets poles down
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thank you, someone else with common sense, last show i went to had 2 teenagers riding in standing martingale and jumping, both kept knocking poles down and the boy kept smacking horse for knocking it down.....idiots. also i didnt even see him in the sj ring so why he was doing practice jump so much??
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also one lad on a skewbald instead of warming pony up ready for jumping gave pony whack on shoulder to wake him up after being stood by ring falling asleep for bit and pop straight over jump!!
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I'm old school me......snaffle with lozenge, plain noseband. No flash/martingale/side reins etc etc.

Frankly...theres less faffing and less to clean.

Brushing boots are enough for me to be messing around with
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with you on that, snaffle, cavesson, saddle...no extras no boots

whats with the 4 over-reach boots thing anyway? it must be rare that a horse would need so much surely? even have them on for turnout here...i try to buy animals that can walk in a straight line without injuring themselves
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3 ring bits are very in vogue. I used to ride a friends horse in a snaffle and he went fantastic but whenever she rode him she swapped the bit for a 3 ring gag!! No idea why but then again I dinlt think she had any idea why either. Also know someone who bought horse with very very hight head cariage. The person didn't have mush experience so when she asked her instructor (who told her that this was the perfect horse for her!!) she just said that she didn't want to see it out of draw reins for 6 months!!! I got her some lessons with a mush better instructor who put her on the correct path and now another instuctor friend teaches her and the horse is coming along nicely with just snaffle not gadgets.
 
i'm old school too.

no gadgets for me. raff is in a cavasson noseband, the mildest snaffle i could find, and nothing else.
i took off his martingale and grackle the week after i got him. why he was ever ridden in them is beyond me!

however, if they were to invent a gadget that made him get his buttocks moving, i'd invest in one... until then, i shall struggle on with my seat and legs... and a schooling whip if he's unlucky...
 
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I'm old school me......snaffle with lozenge, plain noseband. No flash/martingale/side reins etc etc.

Frankly...theres less faffing and less to clean.

Brushing boots are enough for me to be messing around with
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I'm the same - except I can't even be arsed with the
boots.....!!!
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LOL!...new thing for me too...was doing some 'proper' riding - schooling in circles - and noticed he'd clipped himself......so he now has some very smart white Woof Wear brushing boots.
 
Genie's in a french link loose ring snaffle with flash noseband and boots wise we have overreach boots (because she actually DOES overreach, unlike so many horses that wear them!).

When jumping all that changes is that she has a fulmer snaffle instead to help with steering, and when my sharer jumps her she has a running martingale. Cross country we also add boots just on her front legs.

Showing we're in a pelham, but that's the show ring.
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(because she actually DOES overreach, unlike so many horses that wear them!).


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i will admit i used to use flapper boots in the 80's on my pony because i liked the noise, have grown up now lol
 
My mare is 17'3 heavy weight and ridden in a rotating snaffle which to be honest works no different to a normal snaffle, caverson nose band and a saddle which is cut right back at shoulder to help movement. I like to think that the saddle is the only little bit of gadgetry I have on her. Also some people might take this the complete wrong way but in reference to other comments on not being bothered with boots, i used to ride my mare in a full set of brushing boots and we would often plough straight through the poles and she would think nothing of it. She would also brush terribly behind. One day after distroying a series of grids we took them off. She bashed the first one and then went on to clear the rest and has also stopped brushing so much. My theory was she was just being lazy and knew that at her size a little pole didnt hurt with boots on and she could brush her fetlocks together and not worry. Not a very proffesional approach but it highlighted that we didnt actually need boots.
 
We used to ride most of our yougsters in loose martingales. I was once riding a naughty one and the neck strap slid down his neck - I had nothing to hold on to an dhe had something round his ears - not a good combo! We then used martingales instead as they don't slide away. Once they were less flighty we took them off.
I used to get laughed at jumping my old horse and I had snaffle and caverson and he was only 15.2, don't think we looked like a proper horse.
 
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