Biting - no patterns

Question
Not sure I understand the concept/purpose of the empty bag on the stick. How long should the stick be? Wouldn't that just teach her to be spooked be me?
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Followup To

Question -
My husband bought a 13 year old mare a few months ago.  She will take a snack from your hand but has not been one that nibbles playfully. If she wasn't taking something to eat, she didn't seem to see a need to have her lips on you. Until she decided otherwise.
 She has snapped her teeth in the direction of my 6 year old daughter's face when my daughter was standing about 3 feet in front of her (thank God she didn't bite her!). The mare nipped the arm of my daughter and her friend when they were standing at the mare's shoulder area petting her - nipped hard enough to make purple bruises. One evening she stood perfectly still in the open pasture while I brushed her all over and talked to her. She seemed perfectly content. Her ears weren't back or anything. When I finished brushing her, I stepped forward so that my chest was near her left front breast-shoulder area and was stroking both sides of her neck as I continued talking to her. Before I knew what happened, she hit the side of my head so hard with her teeth (with her mouth wide open)that she knocked flat on my back. She began pawing. I didn't know if she was planning to stomp me so I immediately began kicking my legs up in the air as I scooted myself backwards & through the gate.
 Today as we were feeding, we were one bucket short of having all of the horses fed. (Of course it happened to be this mare who was left waiting for her food:-( I happened to be standing near the mare as my daughter went to get the bucket. Again, we were in an open field. (We just moved here and have no individual stalls yet.) I know the mare was impatient for her food. I was talking to her. Should have known better than to be anywhere around her, but I guess I stupidly let my guard down and stood too close to her. I suppose her manner of telling me to shup up and bring on the grub was to act like she was going to nip me on my jawbone. Not anywhere as violently as the previous time, but a nip, just the same. I reached to grab her nose. As I began to grasp it, she began bouncing on her front legs an shaking her head, which pulled her nose from my hand. Her front legs began going higher and higher as if she was going to rear up at me. Again, I had wound up between her and the fence. (How dense am I?) By that time, my daughter arrived with the feed, handed it to me over the fence, and I was able to pour it into the mare's feed bucket which was close by. That ended the episode of today.
 We've looked for a pattern to see if this might be related to her monthly cycles. Not really sure about that. I know this last episode had to do with the food issue, her being spoiled, and me not being in control.
 Since we aren't able to pin down a pattern for this behavior, how can we address it? Except for the food incident, the others have come from out of the blue as far as we can tell.
 One pattern we HAVE identified: She tries to bite other horses if they get ahead of her in anything other than a walk on a trailride.(Very competitive). I wouldn't doubt that she might bite the leg of the rider of the other horse if she was in a position to do so.
 The previous owner said he saw none of this behavior when he had her. He's a friend of ours who knew our kids would be around this horse and we don't think he would have been untruthful about this. He buys and sells horses and had only had this mare for a few months. She is one he had been riding personally.
 She's one of the best riding horses (most cooperative, responsive, even tempered) we have except for this horrible, dangerous vice. HHHeeeeeellppppppppp!

Answer -
Hello,
There is only one pattern. You have an alpha mare! Unfortunately she thinks you all are in her herd and that she has to show you where you stand. If you want to work on it, it could be tough, this is what I would do. Get a stick with a plastic bag on it. Go in and get the halter on her, natural rope halters are the best for this because they are thin and the lead is longer. Have someone come and feed another horse in the field, if and when she even makes a face about dominating make her back up by shaking the bag at her and shaking the rope. She can go anywhere except in your direction. Now she only needs to take a step back so dont over do it. When she turns up her energy she needs to learn you turn up yours just a bit louder than hers. She starts the pressure by acting dominant. This should work with the feeding issue. Another thing to do just for safety is when you are working around this mare at all you could put an empty feed sack on her so if you dont catch a look in time to turn up your enegy, that is what I would do whenever she makes a face at anything, at most she can knock into you but not bite you.
Please let me know how this goes for you!
Best of Luck

Answer
Hello,
The typical stick would be about 3 feet long and lite enough for you to shake it comfortably. The reason a stick with a bag is a good idea is that we want to teach your horse to respect your space for one, and to be okay with a stick and bag (they think its pretty wierd looking at first!) To get her comfortable with it you can have her at the end of the lead and lightly move the bag from side to side while you are walking backwards. Now she may be worried but if you keep adjusting your back up to pull her toward you- if she jumps left start backing right- pretty soon she will feel pretty brave because the bag keeps backing up for her. We want to teach our horses that whatever tool we pull out to use is just an extention of us, therefore if we can build the kind of trust where they really trust us no matter what you pull out, a ball, a scarf, an umbrella, how you handle it will show them that they can trust that you will be clear and ask for what you want in a way they understand no matter what tool you may use. Then when you are out on the trail and she sees something very wierd to her and wants to run away when you say "hey, its okay" she will feel for you and realize you have always been right in the past when you showed her wierd things, and she will choose to be with you instead of running away. Try this and please do email me again and let me know how it all goes for you two.
Best Wishes