Half pads

[UKa]

Hi, I need a sheepskin pad for my girl, it has proven to be the only viable saddlecloth for her. I just don;t want to fork out £70 or more quid at the moment, so looking at half pads. Do you just stick a slim numnah on top of them and how does that fit over a half pad? I would think the sheepskin needs to be in contact with the back to make the difference? Sorry, just cannot visualise how it works and if it is annoying to have two pads. THANKS for bearing with me

 

[becca1305]

Half pads are worn over the top of numnahs rather than underneath as a way of providing padding/adjusting a saddles fit rather than for the purpose of sheepskin on the skin. I have seen them used on their own occasionally, but never with a numnah/saddle cloth on top. Your best bet if a fully sheepskin lined pad is too expensive is to look at half sheepskin numnahs/ saddle cloths. These have the area on top of the back/ under the saddle lined with sheepskin/ wool. Unfortunately regardless of half pad or half lined numnah sheepskin is expensive, wool lined pads will be cheaper so I would consider whether these would fulfill your purpose or whether your horse needs the sheepskin version. Try looking at le mieux (available through horse health) or nuumed, to get an idea about these sort of numnahs and what may suit .

 

[Jane_Lou]

I have a couple of KM Elite high wither half pads, one we use daily and one we keep for competition. The daily use one gets real abuse, rain, mud, sweat, we do use a thin cotton saddle cloth between that and the horse but its over a year old, never had to be washed (brown!) and looks like new. The cream one we have for competition is now two years old and again, looks like new. For the money they are really nice quality.

 

[UKa]

Thanks, I had a cottage craft half lined saddlecloth which I highly rated. Still expensive nowadays to buy though, so thought of options. No point if I use saddle pad under the sheepskin as I want the sheepskin to be what she feels if that makes sense. The one I had lasted me two years of nearly daily use, tried the wool lined ones, but find they are not quite as thick or soft but may go down that route if I can't find the sheepskin I want.

 

[UKa]

Hi nikkimarriet do you have one of these? suppose good thing is you can wash the saddlepad separately? How easy is it to wash/clean the sheepskin? My last pad gave up the ghost so to speak as the skin of the sheepskin started breaking and so was breaking in parts away from the saddlepad... are these longer life maybe?