Sunflowers
Well-Known Member
Guys, i really don't think this is any thing like a roll-kur issue
Having ridden a few fresians, they tend to get very very short in the neck, (by virtue of conformation) and like to curl their noses in - it can be very tricky to persuade them to take your hand forward into the bridle, in front of the verticle.
And with a horse that has this tendency, simply throwing away the rein in an attempt to get their nose out, never encourages the horse to accept and understand the contact, as every time they tuck their head in, you 'reward' that tendancy by giving away the rein...
...So the only way to gently counter this tendency is with a steady hand, with enough positive pressure on the rein to show the horse how you need the contact to be, but vitally a forward-thinking hand so that whenever the horse does take his nose forward into the contact, you can reward and encourage by pushing your hand forward.
Plenty of these photos seem to show exactly this process
Does this make sense folks? I hope we aren't going to demonise Dr Heuschmann, who has been a wonderful proponent of sympathetic training - there are other riders out there who frankly deserve the vitriol, but not in this case i believe.
Having ridden a few fresians, they tend to get very very short in the neck, (by virtue of conformation) and like to curl their noses in - it can be very tricky to persuade them to take your hand forward into the bridle, in front of the verticle.
And with a horse that has this tendency, simply throwing away the rein in an attempt to get their nose out, never encourages the horse to accept and understand the contact, as every time they tuck their head in, you 'reward' that tendancy by giving away the rein...
...So the only way to gently counter this tendency is with a steady hand, with enough positive pressure on the rein to show the horse how you need the contact to be, but vitally a forward-thinking hand so that whenever the horse does take his nose forward into the contact, you can reward and encourage by pushing your hand forward.
Plenty of these photos seem to show exactly this process
Does this make sense folks? I hope we aren't going to demonise Dr Heuschmann, who has been a wonderful proponent of sympathetic training - there are other riders out there who frankly deserve the vitriol, but not in this case i believe.