To be perfectly honest Claire I'm not certain which flexions I showed you with Fidge as he had a slightly different problem to Moo in that he would lean on the bit rather than back off it. I'm fairly sure I would have shown you the ones above.
Pic 1 taking the bit up into the corner of the mouth, waiting for the horse to relax the jaw and chew/swallow. If they lean on the bit raise the bit rings higher and if they lean very badly then adjust the balance backwards by reining back from the the raised hand feel.
Pics 2 and 3 with the same raised bit (ie into the corner of the mouth) take the flexion to the side, it is important not to tilt the head and to get a nice even stretch through the neck. Once chewing/swallowing is achieved then you can take the head slowly out to a stretch forwards, down and out.
Of course the hand has to be very *reactive* in this work, giving almost before the horse relaxes and only ever the smallest ammount of weight resting on you thumbs/fingers.
I learned these years ago but never knew they were *baucher* or *racinet* or *karl*, I was just lucky to have a trainer who had a broader base of knowledge than some. I've seen *germanic* style trainers use them too and I think most people acknowledge their benefits with certain horses.
I took the pics last week to show his *lipstick* but sadly you can't really see it on the shots!!
2 comments:
He's looking good Trudi, starting to lose a little weight too. Thats exactly what I've just been doing with Anky. He looks very calm, much more focussed than Anky.
thanks for that reminder! it was the standing in front and pushing teh bit rings up that i hadn't remembered at all!
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