We are no longer building saddle trees, but we have two videos about how Western saddles fit horses available on our westernsaddlefit.com website.

Cantles

The Cantles Conundrums page was written to help explain, to the best of our ability, the most complicated part of a saddle tree, including the difference between and reason for Regular and Taylor cantles. This section is here simply to show you pictures of some of the various combinations and permutations of cantles we have and can make.

The pictures are in tables so you can compare the outline shapes between different widths at different heights, different cantle angles and either Regular or Taylor styles.

We have pictures at five different angles – 32.5, 35, 37.5, 40 and 42.5. The numbers come from the jigs on which we cut them, and the higher the number, the more stood up the angle. The more stood up the angle, the shorter the distance is between the horizontal line and the top of the cantle for the same measured cantle height. So that is one comparison to make.

The other two main factors that change the outline shape are height and width. Obviously, taller stretches the cantle up and down and wider stretches it side to side.

Most cantles we build are between 12 and 13 inches wide. Due to the number of pictures, we have a page for Regular cantles at 12 – 13 inches wide, and a page for Taylor cantles at 12 – 13 inches wide.

We also build quite a few trees that are narrower than 12”, so we have pages to compare Regular cantles from 10" - 11 3/4" wide and Taylor cantles from 10 1/2" - 11 1/2" wide.

Then there are the special requests – bevel cantles, spade shaped cantles, extra wide cantles, slots in cantles etc. We have a Special Requests page to show you some of that too.