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

the long goodbye…

Rod has spent a lot of time on the phone over the last week calling customers,

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

Yup, we’re still working around the shop. Just haven’t been taking the time to post pictures lately.

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

Is the allusion to a very old commercial showing my age? Anyway… We had a question recently from someone wanting to clarify the difference between crown, flare and relief. Since they are all terms relating to curves on the bottom of the bar, how do you differentiate them?

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 really does seem like things come in groups. We make a fair number of wood post swell forks – about twenty percent or so of our total output – but they are a relatively new innovation in the long history of saddles. We don’t know for sure when they started to appear, but we were quite surprised to find the date of 1986 on an old tree we duplicated a while ago. Looking at the construction on that one, it is likely it was a very early model.

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

you look out at the shop in the morning...

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

Shortly after “the student” left, we took a week away. (I told you it was an intensive course! We needed a break…) Actually, we had been planning for a while to go visit Rod’s parents in southern BC since we hadn’t seen them for a while. It was a good visit, and while there Rod was able do some odd jobs to help them out, including rebuilding the stairs to their deck which were starting to rot. Thus, the background for the picture.

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

The last couple weeks of July we hosted Vern Rempel of VR Saddlery as we taught him how to build trees for his own saddles. Vern has been a long-time customer, having ordered the third tree Rod ever sold, and a longer term friend. He finally decided that he wanted to build his own trees. Any saddle maker we have talked with who builds his own trees has told us that it isn’t for financial reasons. The cost of equipment, setting up a tree shop and education, the learning curve needed, the time it takes to build a tree when you don’t build lots of them – all of these mean that even in the long run it is more economic to purchase trees than build your own.

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

If you read anything about saddle fit and the shoulders, you will learn that the top of the shoulder blade rotates backwards when the horse extends their leg forward. This is often demonstrated by lifting and pulling the leg forward to show you how far the shoulder blade can rotate back. You are then told you have to put your saddle behind that farthest most point or you will interfere with the movement of the shoulder blade. Sounds good in theory. Not necessary in practice. Why? The first issue is that the shoulder blade doesn't go that far when the horse moves it (and we talked about that here). The second and more important point is that it doesn’t matter anyway. Really and truly, honest! Let me explain…  (You'll have seen this fact in a previous post if you were watching carefully.)

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

I noticed that it has been a while since I posted anything about what had been going on around the shop work wise. Rod is still going at normal rate building trees. We had about 5 ½ or so month’s orders ahead of us when we got the diagnosis of his arthritis, so we have all those orders to fill for the time we had promised them before he can slow down at all. Other than the changes in how he uses his hands that we talked about before, it is pretty much same old, same old around here…