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RE: [RC] bits and hackamores - David LeBlancHeidi said: It depends on the amount of force applied. Well, that's true of anything. But running over your leg with a Mac truck more readily does damage than running over your leg with a bicycle... It takes a great deal of force (not that it can't be done) to cause the same amount of pain and injury with a snaffle that you can do with just a little tug when you add 6" levers to a nutcracker... Sure, but you're also a lot less likely to have the snaps fail, and that's always a ton of fun - misbehaving horse and now you have one rein. Anything that you stick on a horse's nose and pull on can be abusive if you pull hard or sharply enough. The times I've seen horses get really torn up, it was always a "mild eggbut snaffle". People think that because they've got a "mild" bit they won't hurt the horse. T'aint true. I've also seen a horse that went really well in a harsh bit - it was just what she was used to, and you just didn't use much (if any) force. Taking the slack out of the reins usually was sufficient. It worked, and I didn't see any need to fix it. Like I said, I don't anticipate using that bit again. Don't get me wrong - I mostly agree with you. Use the mildest device you can manage and still control the horse. If I had lots and lots of time to train the horse, I'd love to show up for an endurance ride with no reins at all. Just pointing out that there's 2 parts to the equation - how much mechanical advantage you have, and how much force. If you reduce one to match the other, it boils down to the same thing as far as the horse is concerned. BTW, a broken snaffle isn't all that mild - put one around your forearm sometime and get someone to tug on it - ouch! It's worth doing just to see what you do to your horse's nose. It's a wonder we don't all get bucked off. =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= Ridecamp is a service of Endurance Net, http://www.endurance.net. Information, Policy, Disclaimer: http://www.endurance.net/Ridecamp Subscribe/Unsubscribe http://www.endurance.net/ridecamp/logon.asp Ride Long and Ride Safe!! =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
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