Ibalansi Horse Center-pty ltd.

08/06/2026

The bridleless trend….
I rode bridle less over 14 years ago, long before it became a popular trend. But what I have learned in the 14 years since and working with with many, many, MANY horses of all breeds and backgrounds since, has taught me so much more:

While i am a huge advocate for bit less riding, I have encountered some horses over the years that prefer the bit over the pressure on the nasal bone. Plain and simple. Not many, but there are those horses too!

I have even seen horses with permanent damage on their nasal bones from strong bitless riding! They had hard calcifications on the nasal bone.

If teeth are left to be sharp or if there are ulcers in the mouth, the bitless bridle pressure may also inflict quite some pain.

Some horses from difficult backgrounds, the ones that had to fight in the past, and those that learned some bad habits may be dangerous to ride bitless until trust and positive associations to being ridden are established!

This is what it should be about at the end- trust into each other, positive experiences together and LIGHTNESS- that softness takes time and commitment to accomplish, but should be the goal even if you don’t have any ambitions to ride bridle less!

In order to reach such softness you will need to spend many hours building a connection and relationship with your horse on the ground. The horse will need to learn how to carry itself in a healthy manner and how to distribute its weight on all four legs for suppleness.

After all you should not ride a stiff plank, hollow, giraffe horse bitless or bridle less as the horses back won’t be able to stay healthy that way.

Next, you can take that relationship into the ridden work. If everything was done correctly on the ground, your horse should automatically be synchronised to your breathing and body tension: if you breathe in and tensen your muscles your horse should pick up speed, if you breathe out and relax your muscles your horse should slow down.

Practice that synchronised breathing while your reins are safely tied to the saddle. Reward your horse for being attentive. Make sure you can stop out of any gait promptly.

While practicing that speed synchronicity, observe your horse’s posture critically! If your horse’s head goes up and the back hollow- go back to groundwork. Also check if your horse is not experiencing any pain or discomfort that may have been hidden or masked before.

If your horse carries itself round and with a tendency to stretch- perfect, your horse is relaxed and comfortable, and you can continue to steering practice

- I don’t like to use a neck rope as it’s just shifting pressure points and the horse’s windpipe is sensitive too!

Steering should come from your weight and seat aid. Practice in a walk first- make a sudden u turn with your whole body and see if your horse will adjust his shoulders to your shoulder angles. Breathe out and reward! The horse will become more attentive to your seat aid and you can slowly increase speed while practicing this steering.

Now you have reached bridle less centaur like riding- you steer through your seat and transition in speed through your muscle tension and breathing. Your legs can be used for lateral exercises.
If you have schooled your horse correctly in a traditional bit set up - you will realise that this should work automatically. If not- you rode your horse through your hands only..

The same concept goes for transitioning from a bit to a bitless bridle- tons of in hand ground work first, so that the horse is light and comfortable.

While you might be eager to jump on the trend band wagon- Listen to your horse !

Do what your horse needs to feel safe and comfortable. Make sure you don’t put the image of bridle less over bio mechanically healthy going horses.

And lastly- don’t put yourself, your horse and others in danger!!!!!!! Wear adequate protection, practice in a safely fenced area, keep the bridle on with reins tied to the saddle until everything is VERY WELL ESTABLISHED!!!

Don’t ride bridle less in public spaces! A horse , no matter how well trained, will always be a horse, and while you may have excellent control over your horse, you DO NOT HAVE CONTROL OVER THE ENVIRONMENT!!!!! Plus, your liability insurance won’t cover you in such cases.

05/06/2026

We are so proud and pleased with all our clients horses progress this week.
All their moms came through to work on the ground and in the saddle with their horses and it was beautiful 😍
First two pictures are of the OTTB Arielle, who came with severe head shaking issues. She is going featherlight and very balanced in the bit less bridle with her mom and showing her mobile, flexible and supple movement off at Liberty.
She has overlapping kissing spine to the side of the vertebrae and gymnastic in hand work is the key to success here.
The vlaamperd gelding Atlas is currently also going beautifully in the bitless bridle with his mom. He is a true sweetheart and gentleman that is so easy to work with.
Little rescue mare Nanouk had her first ride with her mom after we worked through some defensive anger issues and established trust and acceptance for each other. She also surprised her mom with an unexpected baby! Due in July!! I noticed her tummy shape after arrival and a scan of our brilliant fertility vet confirmed it. Ps- the black measured circle is the foal’s eye 👁️

03/06/2026

Horses That Constantly Lose Shoes: Why, When, How – and What You Can Do About It

Few things are more frustrating for horse owners than repeatedly finding a missing shoe. While it may be tempting to immediately blame your farrier, the reality is that shoe loss is often influenced by a combination of factors involving the horse, its environment, management, and hoof quality.

Before pointing fingers, consider the following:
1. Your Horse's Conformation
Conformation plays a significant role in whether a horse is prone to losing shoes. Horses with a short back and naturally close tracking hind limbs are often more likely to overreach. In these cases, the hind feet can strike the front shoes during movement, pulling them loose or removing them completely.

2. Terrain and Living Environment
The environment your horse lives and works in can have a major impact on shoe retention.

* Slopes and hills, particularly when wet or muddy, can cause a horse to slide while travelling downhill. This can place excessive forces on the shoes and increase the likelihood of them being pulled off.
* Waterlogged areas, dams, and deep mud can create a vacuum effect that literally sucks a shoe from the hoof.
* Dirty stables containing excessive manure and urine can weaken hoof horn quality over time, making it more difficult for nails to hold securely.

3. How Your Horse Moves and Carries Itself
Movement patterns are often overlooked but can be a major contributor to lost shoes.
Fresh, energetic horses that enjoy zoomies, bucks, sharp turns, sliding stops, or exuberant play can place unusual stresses on their shoes. During these moments, shoes can easily become twisted or pulled off.
It is also important to assess how your horse carries its weight during work. Horses that are heavy on the forehand often struggle to move their front feet away quickly enough from the tracking-up hind limbs. This increases the risk of overreaching and pulling a front shoe.
Correct strengthening and gymnastic work can help. Through progressive classical dressage training, horses can be encouraged to carry more weight behind, improve balance, straighten the body, and reduce excessive loading of the forehand.

4. Hoof Horn Quality
The quality of the hoof wall directly affects how securely a shoe can remain attached.
Horses with:
* Thin hoof walls
* Brittle, chipping feet
* Soft hoof horn
* Excessive exposure to moisture
are generally more prone to losing shoes.
Improving nutrition, ensuring adequate mineral intake, and supporting overall hoof health can significantly improve hoof quality over time.

What to Discuss With Your Farrier
If your horse frequently loses shoes, a constructive conversation with your farrier can help identify practical solutions.

1. Shorter Shoeing Intervals
Not every horse can comfortably remain on a six-week shoeing cycle.
Some horses grow hoof rapidly and may benefit from:
* Five-week cycles
* Four-week cycles
Allowing the feet to become too long between visits can increase leverage on the shoe and raise the risk of losing it.

2. Optimising Hind Foot Breakover
Discuss whether the hind feet can be safely shortened and rolled back to improve breakover.
A quicker breakover can reduce the likelihood of the hind feet catching the front shoes during movement.

3. Improving Hoof Angles
Long-toed, low-heeled hooves have a delayed breakover point, which can contribute to overreaching.
Gradually improving hoof balance and angles may help reduce shoe loss. In some cases, therapeutic options such as pads or wedge pads can provide more immediate support while long-term hoof improvements are being made.

4. Shoe Fit and Nail Placement
Ensure that the shoes are correctly fitted and that an appropriate number of nails are used to maximise security while maintaining hoof health.

5. Use Properly Fitted Overreach Boots
Well-fitted overreach boots can provide valuable protection.
For horses that are particularly prone to pulling shoes, some owners find success using two overreach boots layered together to create additional protection and space between the front and hind feet.

6. Assess Overall Hoof Integrity
When a horse repeatedly pulls shoes, the hoof wall can become progressively damaged.
If significant wall material has been broken away, there may simply not be enough healthy hoof available to safely and securely hold a shoe.
In these situations, alternative solutions may be worth discussing, including:
* Glue-on shoes
* Hoof casts
* Hoof boots
* A carefully managed transition to barefoot, provided comfort and soundness can be maintained throughout the process

The Bottom Line
A horse that repeatedly loses shoes is rarely the result of a single factor. Conformation, movement, terrain, management practices, hoof quality, and shoeing schedules all play important roles.

The most successful approach is a team effort between horse owner, farrier, trainer, and where necessary, veterinarian. By identifying the underlying causes and addressing them systematically, many chronic shoe-pulling problems can be significantly improved or even resolved altogether.

30/05/2026

And lori still loves to box five years later! Positive associations are key to a successful foal’s development

25/05/2026

Get to know the person, the vibrancy, energy, spirit in your horse. Create a connection to your horse’s heart and not just to his breeding papers, level of schooling or physical appearance- While respecting his experience in a horse’s body with innate senses, equine genetic make up and some involuntary instinctive reactions.
Yes, the horse’s brain is much smaller than our human brain 🧠, but remember that intelligence doesn’t only happen in the brain: the whole spinal cord has neurons- and remember your horse’s spinal cord is much longer than ours! Also we have what scientists call a second brain in our guts:
‘The enteric nervous system (ENS) — sometimes referred to as the “second brain” — is the nervous system of the gut. It contains some 500 million neurons and controls important reflexes, such as peristalsis, the contraction of muscles in the gut to enable digestion.’
Now just remember that your horses hind gut is 7 meters in length!

18/05/2026

17/05/2026

Horses, especially ponies, can teach us everything we need to learn about emotional intelligence.

Observe the herd: they are peaceful and in grazing mode, but yet aware and fully situationally conscious.
If one member oversteps a personal boundary, emotionally or physically, the pony will immediately know what to do with the feeling that arose - some anger.
Instead of dwelling on that emotion and surpressing the anger, the pony will act immediately and clarify her personal boundaries. A second later everyone will go back to grazing mode.

This is called emotional agility. Use emotions as signals , ask the emotion what needs to happen in order to return to grazing? Act accordingly and suddenly you’re not emotional anymore at all, as you have consciously taken action of the now.

14/05/2026

We don’t use liberty work as some kind of trick that was trained on line- liberty work is our two way communication process!
Here is a unedited video of the trust/ self confidence finding process of our new clients Vlaamperd gelding Atlas. The last clip is from today, so this is exactly 10 days of work.
In the beginning we had a very reactive horse, who was stuck between freezing and exploding. So much tension and worry throughout his body. There was no trust into me, the environment or himself even.
I started showing him relaxation by letting him see it in my body first- i bend down, breathing out- he tried to imitate that and found this relaxation quicker and quicker.
He started seeing my breathing out faster and at a bigger distance- and slowly our energies started synchronising and he consciously began to create a circle. Eventually he started to feel relaxed enough in a walk and trot to try a forward downward stretch in the movement too- very important for a friesian body type as their conformation is made to pull carriages; not to carry a rider in a healthy way- so rounding the topline will be a very important step towards healthy riding.
The next steps will be to ask for a more active hindleg in the trot while maintaining a stretch; then canter with relaxation and slowly shifting the weight onto the hindquarters and lifting the head again- but with an active hindleg and swinging back!