English Snaffle
Can I train my horse to do both English and Western?
I have a 6 yr old mare Quarter horse and she's a great trail horse. But I want to start riding English and western. Will it ruin her?
is it a bad idea?
my sister said she saw a horse where all you had to do was change out the bit.
I use a copper D ring snaffle, if I changed it out for riding English, which would I use?
please help!
If you are talking just basic stock horse English and Western pleasure--you shouldn't have any problems, as both are pretty similar, with English mostly asking the horse to stretch out and cover more ground.
If you are considering serious jumping, then that might interfere with Western as there is more of a drastic change in way of going, impulsion, and carriage. Tends to make the horse hotter which would be a challenge to bring back down to the slow and relaxed pace of Western pleasure.
As far as bits---The D ring is fine for English, unless you do any dressage competition (can't have copper). Eventually you would use a curb for Western, but you don't want to just up and change your bit because it takes awhile for a horse to be conditioned to carry a curb. (and absolutely no need for a jointed "curb" with shanks---this would just be uncomfortable, you will want a true curb when ready) They need to have full self carriage and be neck reining before you do this. In the mean time, for Western work, you might consider a training fork---this will not force a headset, but will give a bit more leverage when needed and encourage the horse to relax his neck, while also preparing him a bit for the curb. You would use your English bit with this. Eventually she will get to the point where you can just swap bits, but this takes a lot of training and conditioning--it's the end product, not where you start.
And even then, the curb should be used fairly sparingly. It is for a touch of extra refinement and flexion. Many successful WP trainers mostly use the snaffle and training fork, with the curb being a bit more limited to maintain sensitivity and that extra polish it adds.
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