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

When it comes to saddle trees, there is no question that the cantle is the most complicated part to make.  Some days I swear that cantles have six dimensions to them, not just three.  (Please see our Cantles Conundrums page for further explanations of some of the ideas discussed below.)  We recently received a scan from an old Visalia catalogue.  It had some of their options when ordering a saddle tree and it is interesting to see how they handled some of the same issues that all current tree makers deal with.

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

Getting back to the series on equine anatomy...  There are a few other muscles that attach the front leg to the body of the horse that can be affected by saddling and riding.  The serratus ventralis is an extremely important muscle to the horse as it is the largest muscle holding up the chest between the forelimbs. (It makes up a major component of what is now being called "the thoracic sling".) Like the trapezius and rhomboideus muscles, it has cervical (neck) and a thoracic (chest) sections.

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

Normally we use deerhide for lacing our trees, but our hunter friends were more particular last fall and we didn't get many hides.  So rather than risk running out, we asked our friends with cows for any young calves that might not make it so we could use their hides for lace.  Unfortunately for one neighbour, between the coyote attacks and the scours wreck that happened as a result of the resulting stress, they lost a few calves this spring.  Fortunately for us, they were kind enough to donate them to the cause.  So Rod made rawhide from the skins.

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

Here are some pictures of a couple of Pro Roper saddle trees we shipped out today.  They are both headed to the same saddle maker in Manitoba but despite the name, neither is destined to be primarily a roping saddle.  The only difference between the two is the fork width and gullet height.

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

It is a beautiful, sunny, summer day, so what better to be doing than... cutting up rawhide???  I've done previous posts on making rawhide, and rawiding trees.  This is a job that has to be done between those steps, and at least it is nice weather to be doing it in!  These are hides Rod made into rawhide earlier this week.  They have been well rinsed, and it is time for the final step in the "getting rawhide ready to use" process.

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

A while back I wrote a post about how much pressure is too much under a saddle, saying that everything I had read was based off human studies, and that I hadn't read anything done on horses.  Well, now I have!  There was a paper published in the Equine Veterinary Journal Supplement in November of 2010 by K. von Peinen, T. Wiestner, B. con Rechenberg and M.A. Weishaupt called "Relationship between saddle pressure measurements and clinical signs of saddle soreness at the withers".  In their introduction, they recognize that human pressure ulcers and saddle pressure problems in horses are different things, and "therefore human pressure models cannot be directly applied to horses".  Yes!!!  Somebody recognizes this in print!!  So, in their study they looked at clinical cases presented to the University of Zurich for "poor performance related to a saddle problem".  They measured the pressure on their clinical cases under their normal saddles, ridden by their normal riders, and compared it to  the pressure under a group of control horses without saddle problems ridden in their normal saddles by their normal riders.  Here's what they found...

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

It is funny how things come in groups.  A few months ago I wrote a post about all the Wades we had on order.  Well, June has been metal horn swell fork month.  I thought I would show you some pictures of what the shop has been looking like the last few days.

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

outside the shop!

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

Rod started with this.