Wade Tree Help

[Ken Nelson]

When I was young and on BIG ranches, you could get fired off of most of them for sticking a horse  with your spurs  in the shoulders. And most of them had at least a few horses in the remuda that could have earned a living as broncs going down the road to rodeos.  I have seen rank horses rode in everything from Will James Trees to Chuck Shepard trees.  Just a matter how well you can ride.  The saddle can be an advantage or disadvantage.  Depends on how well it is balanced.  You will  have a better chance in a cowboy ( swell fork) saddle if it is well balanced than you will an arena roping saddle.  And the ultimate advantage will probably be a  small form fitter, which I have never seen a really good cowboy ride. However,  if a horse ever goes down with you,  you will probably be severely injured or killed.  They were regularly  referred to as suicide traps in my youth.  I have never rode one and would not. 

If you think you want a saddle that rides like a bronc saddle, you haven't rode one very much.  They are made to contest in PERIOD.  They are not comfortable to ride and I would think extremely hard to ride a cowhorse in correctly.  BTW  I rode a Hamley  Gold Seal bronc saddle for a couple of summers and it did "leak" more than I liked it too.

If you want to ride colts, the first thing to learn is how to keep them from bucking.  And learn to ride better.  

Just my 2 cents worth. 

[oltoot]

Check out a PRCA spec bronc saddle closely and note that stirrup leathers go under the front pads of the tree to be locked forward, as previously noted, not comfy for prolonged use and not very horse friendly. Stirrup slots underneath must stop where they do to leave some weight distribution area. Everything about rigging placement, ground seat design, etc that can be said has been said; that said trees are like saddles, cheap is not necessarily good.

[Rolandranch]

5 hours ago, Big Sioux Saddlery said:

I bet you did get funny looks from the folks in the car!  I personally am not a fan of Wade saddles; I am a swell fork girl, always have been.  Part of that could be that I've never ridden a Wade that I built for myself.  I'm not very big, and the Wades I've ridden have been a couple inches too big for me, but I like my swell fork saddles, so I haven't been motivated to build a Wade for myself.  I think you should be able to get all the forward movement with a Wade that you would want.  Comparing it to a swell fork is a very general comparison, because there is so much difference in swell forks.  A front with a lot of undercut and leg cut, such as that Bull Moose, will allow for more forward swing than something with less undercut and no leg cut and a big rounded front, but even with those you can usually get all the forward swing you'd need.  Understand also, there is a difference between forward swing and forward hung.  You do want your saddle to be balanced in that your stirrups hang underneath you, and for the most part, stay there.  Stirrups hung too far forward can be as bad as hung too far back.  Use the slots in the underside of the bars as a guide for your top slots.  For me, the goal is to be able to swing ahead if needed.  People who have never ridden anything but western saddles don't realize how much they depend on that 3" stirrup leather to stabilize their legs until they ride an English saddle, and then their legs fly forward because they have been bracing with their feet against 3" stirrup leathers and 8" fenders and don't even realize it.  Bareback is great for balance, and I had to ride bareback until I was big enough to saddle my own horse, but try riding an English saddle once.  I won't say it's more difficult than riding bareback, but it is sure different, especially the so-called "Lane Fox" cutback flat saddles used on the show walkers and Saddlebreds, as there are no knee rolls or thigh blocks on those. 

I agree. I like how my roper saddle's stirrups are hung. I wouldn't want them to hang any further forward. I "earned" an old English saddle from a friend for riding an x dressage thoroughbred 16 miles and fixing his bad crow hopping problem. Later, another friend gave me my first (and last) English riding lesson with that English saddle and I was riding my x dressage 16 hand Hanoverian. It was very different. So different that I wouldn't even go to a lope because I thought it would be way to easy to fall off and 16 hands is a long way down.  It was a good experience, though. My 11-year-old sister broke her ankle a few weeks ago from falling off a bareback horse. I can saddle my horse but I still ride bareback a lot because I'm too lazy to carry a saddle down to the horse corral and saddle a horse when I could already be 3 miles away bareback. I was told by my riding teachers that I ride "well-enough to not need swells". They said a Wade would work well for me and if I felt that I needed swells I could add bucking rolls. I've never ridden with bucking rolls so I don't know how they would feel.

[Rolandranch]

4 hours ago, Ken Nelson said:

When I was young and on BIG ranches, you could get fired off of most of them for sticking a horse  with your spurs  in the shoulders. And most of them had at least a few horses in the remuda that could have earned a living as broncs going down the road to rodeos.  I have seen rank horses rode in everything from Will James Trees to Chuck Shepard trees.  Just a matter how well you can ride.  The saddle can be an advantage or disadvantage.  Depends on how well it is balanced.  You will  have a better chance in a cowboy ( swell fork) saddle if it is well balanced than you will an arena roping saddle.  And the ultimate advantage will probably be a  small form fitter, which I have never seen a really good cowboy ride. However,  if a horse ever goes down with you,  you will probably be severely injured or killed.  They were regularly  referred to as suicide traps in my youth.  I have never rode one and would not. 

If you think you want a saddle that rides like a bronc saddle, you haven't rode one very much.  They are made to contest in PERIOD.  They are not comfortable to ride and I would think extremely hard to ride a cowhorse in correctly.  BTW  I rode a Hamley  Gold Seal bronc saddle for a couple of summers and it did "leak" more than I liked it too.

If you want to ride colts, the first thing to learn is how to keep them from bucking.  And learn to ride better.  

Just my 2 cents worth. 

I think I see what you mean about how the saddle can be an advantage or disadvantage. On my first ride with my first horse, my horse reared and flipped over. I was in a slick fork and was able to bail-out in time. Can you explain some of the pros and cons of slick forks and swell forks? The saddles I ride in are all slick forks. I've ridden in a few swell forks but not long enough to compare an contrast it to slick forks. No, I don't want to ride in a bronc saddle (unless competing in the rodeo). I just want the leathers to be a little more free than my roper saddles. If my horse starts acting up I try my best to keep it under control by one-reining or doing more groundwork before I even get on. I don't want my horse to buck but I do want to be ready for the worst because those animals are a lot bigger and stronger than me so if they decide to buck... they're gonna buck. 

Thanks for the help (It's worth a lot more than 2 cents to me).

-Ryan