Saddle Fitters

[barra]

The NPTC out of the UK (I can't find on their site what that stands for!)

Denise. NPTC is the National Proficiency Tests Council.

Barra

[daviD A Morris]

The Australian one is more interesting. It is run by Horseland - a commercial enterprise. For $1200 dollars (discounted if you are a Horseland employee!) you can take a 2 day course (they say you need certain prerequisites but they are not given) - work for a year (unqualified?), then take an exam. You can take another 4 days (no cost mentioned) to get Level 2 qualification. What I find interesting is the quote

I guess I always assumed that a person actually making a saddle (not just a production line employee, but a real saddle maker) would know more about how saddles work on horses than a tack shop employee with a two day course subsidized by the company they work for. Conflict of interest? I would think so.

Not sure what they actualy teach in that horseland course, but having seen some of its students work, I suspect it just teaches simple answeres to complex problems which also has the effect of providing its students with great confidence. And as you and I know, once you get past the obvious things like " make sure that there is clearance from the spine" in the finer details it there is not always a simple answer. Of course I will concede that you can not always judge the quality of a course by just some of its students, some people study a course and then just go off on their own tangent anyway.

David, I think the SFT is given by the Saddlefit4life group that sells the Schleese saddles endorsed on the Australian site.

I've seen the SFT qualification associated with Saddlefit4life, but as it is used as letters after a persons name I was kinda hoping that there was some more "bona fide" substance to the qualification! Like from a goverment type institution not just from a saddle maker. And it may have, I was just wondering from where.

Denise, why don't you come round to my place and I'll set you an exam on saddle fit, and if you pass I'll award you a certificate that will add more letters after your name. Not sure what those letters might be. Next week I'll come to your place and you can award me master's degree in saddle fit.

Edited April 22, 2009 by daviD A Morris

[kseidel]

Such an interesting topic! Denise, I would like to refute what you have said and have stats to back it up, but the simple fact is that you are correct! There are precious few individuals that really know about saddle fit, and most of us disagree on many points. It has been said that the next world war will be started by saddle and tree makers.

The CSMA still exists. I do not think they have any criteria regarding saddle fitting for their master saddlemakers, and I am on their list as one!

Many horsemen have more practical experience with how a saddle fits a horse in the real world than many professional saddlemakers. In my experience, most saddlemakers do not ride much if at all! There have been hundreds of saddles made, both by hand made saddlemakers as well as factories, that do not fit any horse on the planet! The consumer is, unfortunately, at the mercy of the industry, and the horses, many times, pay the price.

Guess I got on my soap box a bit....

Keith

[Denise]

In my experience, most saddlemakers do not ride much if at all!

Our experience is different than that, Keith. Maybe it is because a lot of our trees go into rigs for working cowboys, but I would say a significant majority of our saddle making customers are riders with quite a few of them having cowboyed for a living at one time. Maybe they don't ride as much now as they used to (having to make a living in the saddle shop cuts into riding time) but most of them really know what they are doing when they are on top a horse. I still maintain that overall (there are exceptions of course) the best saddle makers are the ones whose backside knows the topside of a saddle very well. Using a saddle, particularly for long hours at a stretch, gives you time and incentive to understand how it functions best - top and bottom.

I think the Colorado Saddle Makers Association is still pretty active, but I haven't heard that they tried to put together any accredition process for saddle makers. I wonder about the American Saddle Maker's Association. Other than stumbling onto their website on occasion I haven't heard a whole lot about them, especially lately.

So it doesn't seem likely that there is any official accreditation or training for all these people running around "professionally fitting" western saddles. That is unfortunate in one way as it leaves the saddle buying public looking to find the occasional person who actually has something to offer them in way of information, but vulnerable to well intentioned people with minimal knowledge and lots of confidence, unscrupulous saddle sellers, and outright con artists. In another way it is quite fortunate, because if those of us who actually build these things can't agree on some basics in regard to how we want them to fit, then who will set up the accreditation process? The one who sets the standard, sets up their ideas as being correct. So far, we don't know who is right in the areas of discrepancy. That is why I am so excited about what the next 5 to 10 years will bring in the area of saddle fit. With the new technology available in terms of pressure pads, etc. we should be able to get some solid, scientific evidence on what works best.

PS. David, how come you get a Master's in saddle fit and I just get an unknown something degree?

[Fpotter]

intresting...... What qualifies you as a prof saddle fitter? How about more 30 mile circles in a month than ( im going to step out on a limb here cause thats what i do) Than 99 percent of ALL saddle makers in this country, More differnt kinds of horses than most have ever seen, A pile of used wool blankets that that have been stacked to the ceiling in the tack room and fell over and then more worn out ones chucked onto that pile. 3 generations of no bull---- punchers on your rear end since you were 5 years old, Having to rely on sound horses ( that most often do not belong to you ) for a living, meeger as it may be. These are what criteria I THINK should qualifie you! I absolutly love to build sound functional gear but i have discovered over the last 3 or four years since i started building saddles that their are per capta more uneducated nitwit saddel builders than there are hot shot horse clinicians. This may be a crappy view of this industry but most of the people that are considered the top in this industry are so far removed from wet saddle blankets that it is no wounder the masses are ignorant to the saddle fit questions. That is excactly why if you want to order a saddle from me and you ask ME what you need ill tell you to go find some one who THINKS they know what they are talking about and has a big fancy NAME, Let them give you an opinion. I build gear for cowboys!!!!

[jwwright]

Well, I will agree that there is no doubt in my mind that a person who has sure nuff made a living horseback has better insights into SOME aspects of saddle making / saddle fit.

I have probably made as many horse tracks as anyone alive my age (circa 50). I have made my living from the back of a horse all my life. The only time I have done anything else was to take a town job for a couple years in order to keep things solvent......and I was still horseback then more than most. This is not to brag, or boast, or participate in one-ups-manship.........simply background as to where I am coming from.

All that said, I will say as well that you don't need to have suffered a heart attack in order to be a heart surgeon. You don't need to have been a top NBA player in order to be a good basketball coach (in fact usually those guys are not good coaches). What is required is understanding of the essential elements of the profession, in any pursuit.

JW

[BondoBobCustomSaddles]

Ok, I am not saying anybody's right or wrong! I will simply say this, the way I do it every time, has worked for me. I make templates of the horses back, send them along with the specs for the saddle tree, to the maker of choice. When the tree returns, before I start, I take it out and put it on the horse it is being made for and make sure that it fits. It is much easier to tell when it is the bare tree. So far I have been lucky, only once have I had to add any additional material to get it to fit correctly, (this horse was extremely odd in shape, a cross between an arab and a standard bred!) Once I know that the tree fits, the rest is elementary!

JW and Keith, I have already been through a couple of wars, I am getting too old for that stuff. I'll just keep going along with what works for me.

Bondo Bob

[Saddlebag]

I do western saddle fitting in the broad sense of the term. The people I deal with are fairly new to horses and unfortunately look at the cosmetics of the saddle, buy it, use it and then wind up with a sour horse. All too often the saddle is just a really bad fit. I take several western trees with me as it makes it easier for the person to understand what I'm talking about. It's not easy telling a customer it might be best to sell her saddle and look for a saddle with a particular tree as oftentimes the first saddle has some special significance. I have about 45 years of riding under my belt, and a good saddlemaking course so I have a pretty good understanding of how the horse moves and what it needs. My rates are comparable to what the other services charge for a farm call and that's mainly to cover my gas and wear and tear on my vehicle. I haven't figured out if I've made any money doing this - maybe the price of a coffee.

[Denise]

The difference I see between Fpotter and BondoBob is their market. Frank is building for guys who really USE their saddles on lots of different (yet usually similarly shaped) horses and have enough knowledge of its function from practical experience to know what works and therefore what they want for their area. Bob is building for individual horse owners who want a saddle for this horse and who often don't know a lot. This second one is the market the "saddle fitter" goes after too, and the unfortunate thing is that if they do a lousy job, the owner probably doesn't know it. They believe their saddle is OK on their horses because a "professional" told them it was. So much of the information I have seen on the net about saddle fit is absolute garbage, yet I assume this is what these "professional saddle fitters" are telling people too. That's why we like building for cowboys. They know what they like and they like what we make. Simple. We are just getting more inquiries lately from individual horse owners and people who build for them because we are on the net, so I am trying to learn more about that segment of the industry.

Saddlebag,

You are the first one here to answer the fees part of my question and I honestly don't know what a saddle fitting costs. Could you tell us the what an "average" saddle fitter charges in your area? How long are they out there? What do they look at and do during a call? It seems some people make their living doing this - or do they make the living selling the saddles and the fitting is just part of the package?

[jwwright]

Bob, I certainly meant no disrespect by my comment, nor was I attempting to engage in a "war". I didn't interpret Keith's remarks that way either.

I agree with you Bob...........a fella needs to do what is working for him and his customers..........all the while observing and studying others. I learned long ago that there is always room for improvement and learning.

JW