Did you know that after a cold, frosty night, the sugar levels in the grass our horses are eating can actually spike?

One of the biggest misunderstandings surrounding pressure-and-release bitless bridles is the belief that when you release the reins, the straps should somehow bounce away from the horse's nose, chin or jaw. If they don't, many riders assume the bridle isn't working properly. I've lost count of the number of people who've told me: "The straps don't release." "The cross-under straps stay against my horse's jaw." "My horse can't go bitless because the straps don't move away from his face."

The quagga, pronounced “kwah-gah,” was a subspecies of zebra that was once indigenous to South Africa until it became extinct due to extensive hunting in the late 19th century. Recent genetic studies have shed more light that it is not a separate species as first thought, but a subspecies of the plains zebra, representing the southernmost clade, or ecotype, of the species. (Sorry for the science speak—it slips out sometimes!) That means it was a genetically distinct population that became...