Pony Squishers help me plz - saddling

[DanceswithCows]

My shetland was extremely fat when I got her - not laminitic, but surely only a matter of time. 5yrs old. I said when we'd both lost some chub I'd ride her and happily we've both done well: she's looking trimmer (now just overweight rather than obese) on her new diet and a winter without rugging and I've lost 2st. The grass is already starting to grow though and she will NEED to do some proper exercise in order to keep losing weight, or at least keep it off. She has been ridden by children on a lead rein but I'm not sure on anything beyond that and of course she will need to be fittened up before carrying me a decent way, which all needs to be done before major grass growth arrives so I need to start....yesterday!

Now, although I am almost back to my teenage weight, I am still undeniably a 5ft7 adult and my backside will not fit in a cub saddle! I know there's some taller shetland squishers on here, so what saddles are you using? I'm struggling to find 'proper' saddles for shetlands, they all seem to be pads of some kind, and I'm wondering if I'm just better off bareback given she's so rounded?

 

[exmoorponyprincess1]

Shetland pads have proven to be a god send on my Exmoor so I wouldn't dismiss them! I do make sure I put a decent amount of padding under the pad itself (currently a poly pad with a fully shimmed mattes half sheepskin pad on top of that before the actual saddle pad goes on) and my back lady is delighted with the improvement in my mares back after months and months of struggling with "proper" saddles.

You can get some really nice pads that look like saddles - I think every Shetland that I saw at Hoys was wearing a pad of some description

Good luck!

 

[DanceswithCows]

ah! OK that's good to hear! *googles*