From: meyer@uuisis.isis.org (Katherine Meyer)
Subject: Re: Hard/Soft mouth?
Organization: International Shared Information Service (Ottawa)
Date: Wed, 29 Jul 92 02:57:53 GMT



> Partly I think because he is a bit hot and cantering fast is *so*
> much fun to him...:)
> 
> I remember when I got him a year ago he was perfect about stopping, but
> he was a couple hundred pounds under-weight and so had less energy.
> He's on a relatively mild western bit, a tom thumb snaffle with a curb
> chain.  I did try him on an english egg-but snaffle a few times,
> which he stopped well on in the ring, but not so well on the trail, it
> took longer for him to listen to me telling him to stop on the eggbut,
> which is quite thick.  Does this mean he has a hard mouth? Any advice

Dear Karen,
I don't think that the response time to stop, with the eggbutt, means that 
your horse has a hard mouth.  I also have ridden horses with a hard mouth
and there is just no feeling of control.  Sort of like driving a car with 
really worn out or no brakes I guess.  Anyway, I had a mare that I also
started out with (my first horse) and at first I rode her with a tom-thumb
and a curb chain.  She was supposed to be hard too stop.  But eventually 
I switched her to a med. thickness copper eggbutt snaffle.  And it worked
just fine.  She stopped when I asked her to etc.  So I stuck with that bit.

Another horse I got absolutely hated a bit (and everything else).  So I rode 
switched him to an English hackamore.  This horse was a neglected four year
old quarter horse when I got him he seemed to have been bought by people
with a whim that it would be nice to for their kids to grow up with a young
horse that could be booted around without proper training.  THis horse had
the habit of biting, striking and rearing when I got him.  With patience and
a firm hand I was able to break him completely of the first two habits.  But
he never gave up the rearing -- it calmed down and then got worse as he got
older.  I also found out that he had not been gelded properly and this
caused me some difficulty at certain times (I had to sell him before this
could be fully pursued).  Anyway that's off topic.  This horse had been
riden in a western bit but he fought it.  I tried to get him accustomed to a
bit but he was never fully reliable.  Some of my worst accidents happened
while using a bit with that horse.  It all ended up with me having (at 18) a
major accident where the horse reared, spun, bucked and reared some more in
an eventually successfull attempt to get rid of me.  That has cost me a few
surgeries in the past few years.  But in the meantime I did not give up
riding.

Anyway, my last horse was a thoroughbred that I got directly from the race
track.  That fellow *LOVED* a good run but he always stopped when I asked
him to.  I rode him in a THICK eggbutt snaffle and never had any difficulty
with it.  This horse (I had to sell him) was a pussycat (I think he would
have sat in ones lap if he had been allowed to.  I had to sell this horse,
as I mentioned in another post, because of time constraints, school - doing
my Master's etc.  and I didn't think it fair to the horse to have him not
being doing much work since he loved it so much.

To sum it up, I think (MHO) that (USUALLY) a horses response to the bit has
a lot to do with his training AND his personality.  I think that if you
stick with the eggbutt you'll find that eventually your horse will respond
to it better.  Good luck.  Katherine..  
> Thanks!
> 
> Karen Karlsson
> 
> --
> ----
> Karen Karlsson on Joakim Karlsson's account
> aviator@athena.mit.edu
> ----

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