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Red Bull Agressive
Posts: 5981
   
Location: North Dakota | My sister's horse has huge withers and is not wide in his back but his shoulders are comparatively huge. It looks like the grand canyon behind his shoulders. His previous owners had been using a super thick wool pad (like 1-1.5") and so they gave that to her when she bought him. I was watching her ride and noticed the back of the saddle was popping up. So I felt around and took the pad off and put the saddle on him w/o a pad. It sits ON his withers. NO clearance at all. It's too wide in his back, but is a good width in the shoulder. Same thing when I put my saddle (that fits everything) on him.
She has a tiny budget so will be looking for something used (definitely not over $1000 used, but $500-$800 is more reasonable). She doesn't really know anything about saddle fitting, so I'm trying to help her out. Any recommendations of saddles and/or pads that might fit a horse like this? |
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Red Bull Agressive
Posts: 5981
Location: North Dakota | Open to treeless saddles as well. |
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The Advice Guru
Posts: 6419
| Billy cook from Oklahoma 2030 is their widest, Clinton anderson PRS saddle pad it is pricey but has cutouts at the shoulder the pad is 300-400 new.
The Lisa Lockhart saddle in wide fit by circle y might work.
The other option is for her to save her money and get a saddle custom made. I had to do that for my 4 year old, but she is huge all the way around built like a tank |
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Red Bull Agressive
Posts: 5981
Location: North Dakota | cheryl makofka - 2013-12-18 7:08 PM Billy cook from Oklahoma 2030 is their widest, Clinton anderson PRS saddle pad it is pricey but has cutouts at the shoulder the pad is 300-400 new. The Lisa Lockhart saddle in wide fit by circle y might work. The other option is for her to save her money and get a saddle custom made. I had to do that for my 4 year old, but she is huge all the way around built like a tank
She's quite young so even with saving it will take her a LONG time to afford anything new. She's got her first job lined up for the summer, but even then her entire summer's wages would go to the saddle. My parent's might help her a little, but my mom has 0 horse experience and my dad was a cowboy and just threw any saddle up and rode. The idea of saddle FITTING has never crossed his mind. So they don't see the value in it. Of course I'm on my own and have my own expenses to take care of so I sure as heck ain't buying her a saddle either. :P |
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 Elite Veteran
Posts: 1092
Location: OK | Is this horse really fit? Because most of the time, when a horse gets fit, his back squares up and some of that fills in. In the meantime, you can improvise by shimming to fill in that gap so the saddle doesn't bridge or slide back. Unless this horse is in shape, do not buy something expensive to fit him. There is a pad, It looks kinda Navajo print, it isn't thicker over the withers, but thicker BEHIND the withers. It's called a swayback pad. I think maybe it's brown, black and red or something. Can't remember the catalog I saw it in. Hang on.
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Elite Veteran
Posts: 1092
Location: OK | http://lib.store.yahoo.net/lib/thesaddleshop/prst442t-51-hr.jpg
I don't know how to copy a pic.. lol Anyway, Reinsman makes one, Cashel makes one.
Todd Slone can make you a custom pad, don't know what it would cost, but he's nice to talk to.
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Elite Veteran
Posts: 1092
Location: OK | If the saddle has no clearance over the withers, it's too wide. It shouldn't sit down like that. A wider saddle might not be the answer. Without seeing I'm just guessing here. |
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Red Bull Agressive
Posts: 5981
Location: North Dakota | He's fairly out of shape at the moment due to him injuring himself. But this has been an issue his whole life whether he's in shape or not, it's just a bit more pronounced now. |
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Red Bull Agressive
Posts: 5981
Location: North Dakota | jojammer - 2013-12-18 8:18 PM If the saddle has no clearance over the withers, it's too wide. It shouldn't sit down like that. A wider saddle might not be the answer. Without seeing I'm just guessing here.
Yeah, he definitely does NOT need a wider saddle! Quite the opposite. The issue is that his shoulders are so much wider than his back and he has hollows behind them. |
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Expert
Posts: 1815
| Pro Rider ..........it fit my mare that was built like that, fairly inexpensive and great to ride in as well |
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 A Somebody to Everybody
Posts: 41354
Location: Under The Big Sky Of Texas | Do you have pictures of this horse? |
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 Extreme Veteran
Posts: 421
| My gelding has very large shoulder bones that are much wider than any other area that his saddle rests on or near. I have tried a ton of different saddle and pad combinations. The best fitting saddle I found is a Double J. The #10 and #11 trees. They for lack of better terms are banana shaped so they are wider in the front for the big shoulders, then curve in to fill the depression behind those big shoulder bones. Double J even does a demo program for you to try them out! Couldn't be happier with the fit I finally came up with |
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 Elite Veteran
Posts: 1035
Location: TN | Sounds like he has muscle atrophy behind his shoulders from narrow saddles and/or too thick of a pad. If the saddle pops up in the back, it needs to be shimmed (put a piece of sheepskin or a shim under the front to fill in the gap behind his shoulders). Check out the Martin saddle fit videos on YouTube, they explain it much better than I can. There is one with Sherry Cervi and several others. Here are links to a few.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l4iVhzeegyk
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fhwwuDJOIAE
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3tRK3PahssY |
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  Keeper of the King Snake
Posts: 7622
Location: Dubach, LA | Check out the Classic Equine Bio Fit Pad. It might help until she can get a better fitting saddle.
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 Money Eating Baggage Owner
Posts: 9586
Location: Phoenix | I'm dealing with the same issue...does your horses' shoulders look like mine? Part of it is muscle atrophy, but part is due to how he's built. I always thought I needed a different saddle, but I think the one I have fits him better than anything else I've tried so far. (Shiloh and Double J Pro Rider). I'm riding him in a Tod Slone, and I notice I used to think that I rode with it behind the shoulder, but when the pad is on, I place it more on top of his shoulder area in order for it to fit amd not restrict. There's some resistance when I initially try to get my hand underneath to feel around because his shoulder is so big but after that it feels fine. I'm going to try a Biofit pad, but Ed Wright used to make a pad with a half moon insert on the underside that seemed like it would work nicely. I'm wondering if I should get shims in the meantime.....anyways, does this sound like your horse/situation??
Edited by hammer_time 2013-12-21 3:04 AM
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 Extreme Veteran
Posts: 368
Location: Ellensburg, Washington | Have you looked into a Corrector pad? Gives you lots of different options for shimming both the front and back. |
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 Veteran
Posts: 164
Location: Oregon | I have the same exact problem you do.
My gelding had bad muscle atrophy from his previous
owner, and all the saddles i had were still too wide...
I am currently using a BIO FIT pad and a billy cook barrel saddle,
and this combo has helped immensely. BUT i have to pull the BIO FIT back enough to fill the gap behind his shoulder. And now that he is starting to fill out mostly everything is fitting better and i am looking for a new pad since he doesn't "need" the BIO FIT any more ;) .... any questions about this you can ask me!   |
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Red Bull Agressive
Posts: 5981
Location: North Dakota | hammer_time - 2013-12-21 2:47 AM I'm dealing with the same issue...does your horses' shoulders look like mine? Part of it is muscle atrophy, but part is due to how he's built. I always thought I needed a different saddle, but I think the one I have fits him better than anything else I've tried so far. (Shiloh and Double J Pro Rider). I'm riding him in a Tod Slone, and I notice I used to think that I rode with it behind the shoulder, but when the pad is on, I place it more on top of his shoulder area in order for it to fit amd not restrict. There's some resistance when I initially try to get my hand underneath to feel around because his shoulder is so big but after that it feels fine. I'm going to try a Biofit pad, but Ed Wright used to make a pad with a half moon insert on the underside that seemed like it would work nicely. I'm wondering if I should get shims in the meantime.....anyways, does this sound like your horse/situation??
Yeah, that is pretty similar. Buster has bigger withers, but has hollows like that. He is 1/2 thoroughbred, so he's narrower with the big withers. I've never had to deal with this issue before. My mare is easy peasy to fit and my saddle is a flex tree so most other horses I ride I've been able to get it to work on. |
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