Kathy, do you have any suggestions for the forward one of a pair that can't stand to have the other mule get even with her? I have the coupling reins adjusted to hold her in without jerking on his mouth, and I shorten his traces so they will tighten up sooner. All this works somewhat, but she has such a work ethic, every time I push him up with her, she speeds up. When I tell her "walk", she does, 3 steps, then wants to trot again. Even when she is relaxed, and walking along quietly, he has to be a pace behind her or she speeds up. I have tried her with two partners, and she is the same way with both. Is this just the old story of the girl doing all the work, and the guy letting her? I did have a teamster friend suggest trying the buck-bac strap, but I haven't tried it yet. ----- Original Message ----- From: kathy robertson<mailto:goodhors@xxxxxxxxx> To: drivingpairs@xxxxxxxxxxxxx<mailto:drivingpairs@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> Sent: Wednesday, May 17, 2006 7:54 AM Subject: [drivingpairs] Another Idea Or Two Reading the buckback system posts with interest. I have heard of it, never used one or saw it in action. Tying the forward horse back doesn't sound like it will be productive in settling him to match the pokey one. Even switching the line back from bit to halter, may not work. We prefer the forward horses, but don't use them to make our living. I had another suggestion, regarding the evener. When we start our young horses we tie the evener down. The main beam has no movement, does not swing at all. The reason for this is to prevent any see-saw action when starting out. Young horse is not pulled back as he starts to step out, confusing him. Trained horse will usually respond quicker, so his side of evener would pull forward first, jerking breastcollar of young horse into his chest. The other suggestion of getting after the lazy horse so he responds more quickly is better. Lazy horse is stepping at Walk, while forward horse is stepping at On of the Walk ON command. In our driving multiples experiences, there is ALWAYS a MORE LAZY horse in a pair. You can put two lazy ones together and one will out-lazy the other, who then becomes the forward horse of the pair. Two forward horses, and one will be lazy. The forward animal may get anxious, frustrated with slow horse, over respond, where they didn't in the old pair. Just seems to be a fact of driving horses, however you put them together. One forward, one slower in every pair. Trust me, we have tried mixing and matching every way! Same with other peoples pairs or fours. They usually get mad at forward, instead of fixing lazy. This interesting quirk of nature makes you the driver, have to teach the slower horse to move up, keep up, march along with his buddy. Retraining is the best method. Tune lazy up a bit, so forward doesn't think he HAS to do everything. Tied down evener helps because Lazy doesn't punish Forward as Lazy is encouraged to step up, lengthen stride. Keep traces tight. Takes some extra attention to keep Lazy going, maybe some rein adjustments would be helpful. We do lots of rein adjustments as we go along, even with older horses. Horses may be more or less forward today, than yesterday. You do need to be a busier driver, attentive to when Lazy slacks off working. Hangs back with traces loose. Have you ever used Achenbach reins, with the 11 hole adjustment set-up? Longer coupling rein can get buckles closer to your hands for easier adjustment. I don't know anyone who can just pop a new horse in the pair, Light horse or Drafts, then expect them to move evenly, stay together, without doing some work. Horses need to learn each other, learn to move together as a single unit. If not taught, they go back to Lazy and Forward, not smooth. Farm pairs have to pull evenly, stride together. Takes work to teach them to move well together, carry the load forward, in stride. I think the buckback may work somewhat, but is not going to fix the problem in the long run. You are trying to fix the wrong horse. I put this in the artificial aids, like too short running martingales used daily. Too short has the downhill angle, reins usually tight so pull is obvious. Yes it holds heads down. Put on automatically for every horse going thru the barn or discipline. Take it off, head goes up again. Maybe we could try some other methods to show horse a different self-carriage like long lines? Perhaps rider needs to change their technique? People using a running martingale that is slack, correctly adjusted, as a possible preventative to problems, reschooling aid, is different. Still artifical, but not constant pressure on horse. A martingale on a noseband in the hunt field, is not the same class of artifical to me. Standing martingale would be a safety feature. Not a constant pull when adjusted correctly, only kicks in when your face might be in danger. Flippy heads can be very hard to correct, especially in an exciting setting like hunting. Even one facer to rider is too many. Happen very fast. A martingale here is usually the last resort, many other things have been tried to correct the problem. We don't care for sidereins either. No reward to the good working horse, just constant pull until they learn the dreaded "behind the bit" or weigh a ton on your hands. "Sure, you can hold me up, I'll let you!" We see much better give and collection with teaching on long lines. Driver gives instant reward to good behaviour, correct body position. Horse learns and develops body to work in correct positions. Long lines are not a FAST way to build a horse, but he does do it right. All the above are aids, but usually fixed on horse. He is forced into position, not trained to do self work correctly. Not responsive as he should be. If you train then take the aid off, does he continue to do the job correctly? Does he do the job well for a long time, not just a few minutes? This is correctly retrained, not forced to work. Some things just can't be fixed. I would never trust a head flipper to not revert when excited. Hope the tied down evener and rein adjustmen ideas might be helpful. Add it to your other information for consideration. Daily driving, city work is a whole different ball game than pleasure only. Different considerations. I don't envy you there. Hope you can get the pair smoothed out. Kathy Robertson __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com<http://mail.yahoo.com/> _________________________________________________________ To Unsubscribe, change to Digest or Vacation mode go to: http://www.drivingpairs.com/dpmem.shtml<http://www.drivingpairs.com/dpmem.shtml> `````````````````````````````````````````````````````````