Anyone had experience of gel pads burning/marking a horses back?

siennamiller

siennamiller

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As title really, I am looking at getting either a gelpad for under the numnah, or one of the double sided acavallo numnahs, but someone said that you have to be careful not to mark their back?
 
Some horses don't like the way they can pull on the hair. If you have a lot of saddle movement it will pull the pad which in turn will pull the hair. Working in a tack shop and constantly battling with the things to get them out and in the packaging I can say they are very very sticky and to me would mimic waxing! Used as a shock absorber between pad and saddle seems ok to me but against the hair is something I personally wouldn't do on my horse.
 
I saw a photo on fb yesterday of a horse who had worn one between skin and numnah and it had suctioned the skin into the creases and the horse understandably flipped out due to the pain. Not tried them myself but if I were you I would avoid using them directly on the skin :)
 
I ended up sewing the undersides of numnahs with the stuff you get to stop rugs (i.e. house rugs, not horse rugs) slipping. It's soft, so doesn't hurt the horse's skin. It's a cheap and effective solution, with the added bonus that you can sew it just where you want it, which in my case was on the bottom sides of the numnahs/saddle cloths.

This is the same as the 'stuff' I bought : http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/ANTI-NON-...-GRIP-DASH-30CM-X-150CM-DURABLE-/130695445091
 
I have a thin non slip gel. Used it once on the skin. Left marks and pulled the hairs whilst it's non slip it pulls the hairs in the direction the saddle would slip and causes discomfort. Better to use a breast plate or a diff saddle I think. The ones I've seen cause big damage is the gel risers which don't need to be on the skin
 
I would never put a gel pad directly on the skin always under th saddle over a cloth or numbs have. However I bought a non slip pad last year when I bought a very overweight cob so I could excercise to get his weight down, it is like a sticky mesh made in Italy and that goes under the numnah and has been fab even on long rides.
 
Have never had a problem using an Acavallo gel pad next to the skin. Just make sure it's washed regularly to remove sweat or grease etc.
 
The trouble is that she is wonky, and so am I, we are having regular Bowen (both of us), and it is improving, but all the time the saddle is sitting to one side we can't improve that much. Saddler re flocked more on one side to try and even it out, but not sure this is the answer. Aargh, what to do!
 
muddygreymare said:
I saw a photo on fb yesterday of a horse who had worn one between skin and numnah and it had suctioned the skin into the creases and the horse understandably flipped out due to the pain. Not tried them myself but if I were you I would avoid using them directly on the skin :)
Click to expand...

I saw that picture too. It looked horrendous :(
 
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