We are no longer building saddle trees. We have two saddle fit videos available on our westernsaddlefit.com website. Western Saddle Fit - The Basics, aimed at riders, is available either on DVD or streaming on Vimeo while the six hour series Well Beyond the Basics, aimed more for professionals but understandable by anyone, is available by streaming on Vimeo. (We left this website up because we have had many requests to keep the information available.)

When we started the business over twenty years ago, Rod built his workbench, and the table. He built them the same height as each other so they would match, and the height chosen was the height of the table on the band saw. This way he could use either table or bench to support the end of a long board that hung a long way out past the band saw when cutting.

We are no longer building saddle trees. We have two saddle fit videos available on our westernsaddlefit.com website. Western Saddle Fit - The Basics, aimed at riders, is available either on DVD or streaming on Vimeo while the six hour series Well Beyond the Basics, aimed more for professionals but understandable by anyone, is available by streaming on Vimeo. (We left this website up because we have had many requests to keep the information available.)

I know this isn't about horses, or saddles, or trees - but suicide has touched our lives personally a number of times. The barricades that stop us talking about mental health need to be broken so that hope can come to suffering people. This first time event consists of eighteen hours of incredible music from thirteen professional concerts across the country, all volunteered, with the goal of bringing awareness to mental health and suicide prevention. The concerts are free, and it is being live streamed from a link on the website for the full duration of the concert.  Some of the artists normally command thousands of dollars per performance, but all the musicians and almost everything about this event is being volunteered by people who see the need to open up communication and remove the stigma about suicide and the mental health issues that so often lead to it. Information about mental health and suicide prevention will be available at all the venues and people will be present to talk with as well. Please go to the website to learn more, share the links, live stream the music or, if you are close to the venues, go to the concerts themselves.  It will be a day of hope and education. Please join it!

If you want to know more about the background to the concert, here is a link to a short video where the president of this organization, Elizabeth Turnbull, talks about the concert and her late husband.

We are no longer building saddle trees. We have two saddle fit videos available on our westernsaddlefit.com website. Western Saddle Fit - The Basics, aimed at riders, is available either on DVD or streaming on Vimeo while the six hour series Well Beyond the Basics, aimed more for professionals but understandable by anyone, is available by streaming on Vimeo. (We left this website up because we have had many requests to keep the information available.)

In part one about rider effects on the horse, we talked about the effect of movement - horse and rider - on how the rider impacts the horse. (Pun completely unintended.) But how about rider position? What have studies shown about that?

We are no longer building saddle trees. We have two saddle fit videos available on our westernsaddlefit.com website. Western Saddle Fit - The Basics, aimed at riders, is available either on DVD or streaming on Vimeo while the six hour series Well Beyond the Basics, aimed more for professionals but understandable by anyone, is available by streaming on Vimeo. (We left this website up because we have had many requests to keep the information available.)

has been built…

We are no longer building saddle trees. We have two saddle fit videos available on our westernsaddlefit.com website. Western Saddle Fit - The Basics, aimed at riders, is available either on DVD or streaming on Vimeo while the six hour series Well Beyond the Basics, aimed more for professionals but understandable by anyone, is available by streaming on Vimeo. (We left this website up because we have had many requests to keep the information available.)

Well, Rod rawhided his last tree on July 23rd. Now not only is the orders-in-waiting clip empty, but the working-on-orders clips are all empty as well.

We are no longer building saddle trees. We have two saddle fit videos available on our westernsaddlefit.com website. Western Saddle Fit - The Basics, aimed at riders, is available either on DVD or streaming on Vimeo while the six hour series Well Beyond the Basics, aimed more for professionals but understandable by anyone, is available by streaming on Vimeo. (We left this website up because we have had many requests to keep the information available.)

Dusty came to visit us in February to learn to build saddle trees. We knew he was high energy when he wanted to get here so much that he made the plane arrive early and was standing on the edge of the curb waiting for us when we drove up with what should have been lots of time to spare…

We are no longer building saddle trees. We have two saddle fit videos available on our westernsaddlefit.com website. Western Saddle Fit - The Basics, aimed at riders, is available either on DVD or streaming on Vimeo while the six hour series Well Beyond the Basics, aimed more for professionals but understandable by anyone, is available by streaming on Vimeo. (We left this website up because we have had many requests to keep the information available.)

Daring to walk into a lion’s den here… When discussing “big picture saddle fit”, we have to look at more than just the tree and the saddle. There are other factors that affect the pressures on the horse. (We give a run down on these on our Troubleshooting Saddle Fit page.) One of the main ones that can be touchy to discuss is the effect of the rider. But here goes…

We are no longer building saddle trees. We have two saddle fit videos available on our westernsaddlefit.com website. Western Saddle Fit - The Basics, aimed at riders, is available either on DVD or streaming on Vimeo while the six hour series Well Beyond the Basics, aimed more for professionals but understandable by anyone, is available by streaming on Vimeo. (We left this website up because we have had many requests to keep the information available.)

Around about 11:10 am today things in the shop looked pretty much like they may have looked any time in the last quite-a-few years. Rod was rawhiding a tree…

We are no longer building saddle trees. We have two saddle fit videos available on our westernsaddlefit.com website. Western Saddle Fit - The Basics, aimed at riders, is available either on DVD or streaming on Vimeo while the six hour series Well Beyond the Basics, aimed more for professionals but understandable by anyone, is available by streaming on Vimeo. (We left this website up because we have had many requests to keep the information available.)

Like we said last November, this has been a long winter of goodbyes, as one by one we have made The Last tree for individual customers, some of whom we have been supplying trees to for twenty years. But now we are getting down to the final few trees, and we are hitting some of The Last times we are doing certain parts of the job.