A means of controlling a
horse mostly used in
western riding. For most of history, horses were controlled using the two reins
independently to indicate which
direction you wanted the horse to go. Of course, in the
old west, this caused a problem becuase you might need a hand for say, shooting or
roping. And you know, training your horse to repsond to leg
pressure is just too much work I guess. Insert neck reining.
So basically what you do is train the horse to respond to the pressure of the reins on the neck. The reigns are tied in a knot so it kinda forms a loop. To move the horse right, you move the reins to the right so that the left rein falls against his neck. When the horse feels the rein on the left side of his neck, he is trained to move away from it, hence he goes in the direction you want. And there you go, one handed control with very little pressure on the mouth being invovled.
And now you know.