Differing view on bending and asking horse to lower manager?
I am currently teaching my horse how to bend and to relax his head down. I was other taught to open and close my fingers to ask him to lower his head and stop as soon as he does. As for bending, I be always taught to hold steady pressure beside the outside rein and open and close my inside hand (along near leg aids.) Recently my friend went to a dressage clinic and the clinician had some different ideas on how to do these things. They qualified more of a steady pressure instead of the open and close technique. What do you guys do to ask your horse to bend and relax the head? Has anyone tried different methods and found one to be better?
It depends on why you are opening and closing your hand. If you are asking for a lateral bend of the spine, and the horse is responding to your leg and seat, afterwards your hands can remain steady. You only want to open if a release is needed for a reason, and close whether more contact is needed. The key to it is in remembering that every thing you do is a sign to your horse. When a signal is not needed, there should be none.
True bend comes from the horse yielding his ribs to the pressure from the inside leg (the leg on the inside of the bend). The purpose of the reins is singular prevent the horse from taking his nose out of the bend. Opening and closing your hand on the reins creates gaps within the contact. To get an idea of what it feels resembling to your horse, hold a bit in your hands to simulate the horse's mouth. Have a friend take the reins as they stand trailing you, pick up contact and then open and close their inside hand. You will get the impression how the slightest change in your contact and movement of your hand is transferred into your horse's mouth (or antenna if you ride with a bitless bridle).
Put your horse in "obedient hands" by keeping your hands in gentle fists and maintain consistent contact.
I have used both methods, depending on the horse and how it be initially taught.
Since you are doing the teaching, i'd say it's up to you!
I believe within constant pressure and giving (but not fully releasing contact) when the horse does.
I have been qualified both ways but believe that the constant pressure is saying to your horse "please follow this direct instruction," when he/she does the give is "thank you, here is your reward." Whereas the fixed open and close can get a little confusing, giving him the appropriate boy release before he has done anything and then asking for it again.
As another poster mentioned whether your horse has been trained with the start on close method, it will get the job done, but personally I do not get the impression that it is the simplest/most direct method.
This is just my personal training belief, make of it what you will =)
we have always used the opening and closing fingers to slow down the gait but at the sae time it does help lower the head what breed is your horse?
It help lower the head but I dont put too much pressure on the reins and I ask the horse to go fowards nicely, to bend I also use my counterbalance and seatbones more.
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I'd do how I was qualified.
Answers: I be initially taught to supple, the opening and closing technique. It works extremely well on horses that enjoy been trained that way and have be asked like that over several years. When I began the process of training my Quarab, someone I greatly admired suggested that I try to hold constant contact when her organizer was in the wrong position and letting off when she is right. I think that the latter is a better training technique. If you think about it, you try to train your horse to bestow to pressure. When they give, so do you. However, when suppling, you're constantly grabbing and giving rein until they put their head down. You're giving rein for a millisecond, BEFORE they let go, which seems a bit counterproductive and counter intuitive to me. I think it makes more sense to one and only release when they give to the pressure. Along with the constant contact, I really ride my horse into the bridle beside leg aids and a driving seat, in effect riding them into their nose, holding near the reins until their head drops.The constant contact technique worked very very well for me and my horse, as well as my sister's QH (we did both of our horses' training at the same time, so we used similar techniques).
Ask the horse to bend over
