Hi Nancy >>>Well, I probably won't be doing that, but I did put a sidepull on Yrsa the other night. Being a traditionalist, I have always done my ground driving with a snaffle bit. Is there any reason not to drive with a sidepull?
Linda started teaching starting young horse courses for amateur owners in the 70's and then and now we always start young horses ground driving from a halter or sidepull. It makes not sense to me the way that people show starting young horses by ground driving from a bit when they have no idea what it means and with the weight and length of driving lines - no matter what they are made of, it is a tremendous weight on their mouth. It is much different from when you are holding reins and there is only about 3 feet between your hand and the horse's mouth. With driving lines there is 4-5 times that distance - increasing weight and making the signal even farther to travel. We are just back from the fifth Expo this month and I am sorry to say that some of what I see as being taught as good horsemanship is IMO very high stress training methods. Robyn Hood - also just trying to recover from the flu...
