Chi Stockyrd Saddle Tree

Chicago Stockyard Saddle Tree, owned by Heath Howes and Ben Haile started not too long ago as a "brother" company to Laporte Saddle Tree, owned by Shawn Howes. CSST makes the Lite-Ride Tree® and LST makes the Poly-Tuff Tree®. CSST not only builds their own saddle trees but carries and orders through LST and Bob Wattus Saddle Trees to insure more shape availability for the saddle maker.

Our Saddle Trees

Our product, the Lite-Ride Tree® is a revolutionary design in that it nullifies the issues of using wood and rawhide trees.

The Lite-Ride Tree® is created out of a high density urethane that is poured not injected into the molding. This eliminates any

weak points from the injection sites, while still allowing for a consistent shape. The polyurethane that we use has a test

strength of over 3000 PSI, guaranteeing plenty of strength. Even with all that durability the Lite-Ride Tree® is still a semi-rigid

tree to help flex with the movement of the horse and unlike other "plastic" trees it is not prone to snapping. The Lite-Ride comes with the ground seat built in to every model which can be covered comfortably with only a single

layer of leather. This eliminates a large amount of time and money for the saddlemaker and allows them to spend time on

better customizing their saddles to their customers. Speaking of customizing; the Lite-Ride is one of the most customizable tree on the market. It can be sanded, drilled, nailed, and imprinted upon

without losing strength or requiring a new layer of fiberglass. Unlike other "plastic" trees the Lite-Ride also allows the saddlemaker to re-screw the

same hole twice without it stripping out. This allows the tree to be reworked if a saddle owner purchases a new horse - the saddlemaker can then

modify their Lite-Ride tree to accommodate the new horse's needs without requiring the purchase of a whole new tree. The Lite-Ride is such a great

tree that you can actually just throw the rigging and stirrup leathers on it and ride away, it's that solid and comfortable! The Lite-Ride allows almost

complete customization, has high strength, durability, and the ability to be reworked -- and with all of that, weighs only around 10 pounds. The company was set up by Heath Howes and Ben Haile, when they realized there needed to be a saddle tree company willing

to meet the demands of the rider's of today. CSST is driven to meet those demands such as: consistency, strength,

availability, workability, and customizability. CSST derives its name from the iconic stockyards of Chicago's yesteryears. And like the cowboys of those days, Heath

and Ben found themselves "pushing cattle" along the old routes of the Shawnee Trail from St. Louis and the

Goodnight-Loving Trail from Denver to meet up in Chicago. There they met in common goals and interests that would

found the company, Chicago Stockyard Saddle Tree.

The Material

The Lite-Ride Tree® is made of a high density urethane. Similar to material used for ballistics shields. This attribute makes the trees able to hold screws, nails, and tacks. Temperature changes have no bearing on the trees what-so-ever. With a few passes of a rasp you can manipulate the bars from 22" semi-QH bars to TN Walker bars, or even Gaited Horse bars just to name a few.

The remarkable thing about these trees is the manipulation of the material. For the first time ever the saddle maker has complete control over the shape of his saddle tree. If you have a problem with a tree(wood in resin or wood in fiberglass) you sand it down and then you have to patch it up. Hours are spent with reworking and covering. With our trees, you get a saddle that comes in, drop the skirts, sand the problems areas down , pop the skirts back on and ride away. You can take the rock out of the bars if you're fitting flatter backed horses. Round down the fronts of the bars and the backs to fit small backed horses. Grind the gullet to make it taller or wider. But that's as far as you have to go. you don't need to re-fiberglass or re surface the resin. You're done with the job. More time in you pocket, means more money.

How do you save with our trees? Putting a ground seat in takes hours. 16hrs on average. 200 ground seats a year, on average. You pay a guy or yourself $8/hr, on average, to put a good ground seat down. That's $25,600 that a saddle maker is spending on ground seats. And if you have to mess around with resurfacing the tree, even more. Allow us to let the saddle maker save time, and money.

Cable Rigging

As a youngster in the 1960's working as a dude wrangler and hunting guide, Mark Howes first played with the idea of using a cord to set the position of rigging and to replace the rigging on pack saddles. In the 70's he went into the business of saddle making, and using his experience on the pack saddles, refined the cord rigging.

It was in 1976 that the Double H Ranch Saddle Shop was formed. Mark spent these years testing and using various cords for his new rigging, finally narrowing his choices to a heavy nylon cord. At this time, the trees on the market were all wood and rawhide. One particular problem kept rising up; securing the ends of the cord to the tree. At a point in these early stages of development a friend, Don King, told Mark about a saddle company called Hamley. In the 1920's they used a similar "cable" rigging, but had the same problems due to the lack of technology and stopped exploring the concept. Convinced the idea was solid, Mark was determined to continue to experiment with the basic design.

A fortuitous meeting occurred in 1986 with a customer, Curt Banks, who worked for an industrial supply company, Mark found what he was looking for. Banks sold a coated air-craft cable that Mark fitted into the saddle. Using the new cable, Mark put in a continuous loop onto the tree thus creating an adjustable rigging, suiting each particular horse's confirmation. Banks had ordered a wild horse racing saddle and he and his team went on to become champions on the new saddle made with Mark's rigging.

Access to quality wood and good rawhide was becoming more difficult, so Mark started to experiment with a man made spray coating that was stronger than rawhide. He was also casting parts of the tree out of plastics and foams. His objective was to create a tree that would be the same every time it was made making the job of the saddle maker easier and more efficient. Mark then decided to create his own saddle tree company.

In 1994, with the help of his oldest son, Shawn Howes, they began to design and cast a composite tree that could be moulded with the cable. Casting all the parts of the tree together was more practical, and created a stronger saddle tree. They discovered that the cable could be placed directly into the mould before casting, thus eliminating the problems of attaching the cable to the tree. This was the solution Mark was looking for; a smooth, clean, functional saddle tree design that would be the same each time it was cast and a strong anchor for the cable. This was the birth of the Laporte Saddle Tree and the Poly-Tuff Tree® with the Double H Ranch Cable Rigging®.

A short four years later in 1998Mark and Shawn had a pretty good product, well tested in the field on working ranches. They refined the casting process of the trees which speeded up production and marketing. The reputation of the successful Laporte Saddle Tree spread, and in 2001, impressed with the popularity of the tree, Hitching Post Supply, a high standard catalogue and leader in "tools of the tradition" asked if they could put the Poly-Tuff Tree in their 2002 catalogue. Mark and Shawn quickly agreed, and this promotion helped the Laporte Saddle Tree and Double H Ranch Saddle Shop to become the successful business they are today.

As a saddle maker, Mark continues to look to the future for new directions and ideas; as well as refining old

ideas for saddle making and saddle trees. Recently his youngest son, Heath Howes, started another saddle tree business called the Chicago Stockyard Saddle Tree, which will focus on trail riders in the equine industry. Mark,

Shawn, and Heath continue to test new kinds of plastics for trees and a variety of cowboy gear that will enhance the riders experience and ease the work of cowboys and stockmen alike.

Traditional Design

The is a lot of confusion out there about saddle trees today. Today's methods of construction, not just in saddle trees but saddles and leather goods, have changed drastically from what was done "back then". We like to keep our ties in the past. The cable rigging had established itself in quite a few saddle shops. From Oregon, to California to New York. Many of these beautiful saddles are brought out for display at King's Saddlery Saddle Museum and rotated with other saddles throughout the years. Looking at these saddles, a smooth sleek design comes from use of the cable. Our trees try to re-create these masterpieces done by traditional artists of the 1920's.