Saddle for NF?

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Gracie21

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Saddlers haven't been able to come up with anything second hand.

He has a lot of shoulder, high wither, short back (16" fits me and him), extra wide and is a typical barrel too! :confused::cool:

What would you put on him? Lots of GPs are out the question because they interfere with his shoulder. I don't want a dressage saddle because he does a lot of SJ & XC. Have tried a couple of working hunter saddles but everything slips forward, even with anchor & balance straps!

Hot chocolate on offer. Thank you :)
 
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I've personally found Amerigo's quite good to fit to horses. I have a 17" Amerigo DJ with a long and forward flap that I LOVE to bits (in all seriousness - that saddle is coming to the grave with me). My horse has a large shoulder and it's difficult to find things that fit and doesn't interfere with his shoulder but can accomodate my long leg.
 
I had a saddle company saddle on my forester. Brilliant saddle as it can be adjusted. May be worth getting hold of one second hand (ebay?) and then ring martin andrew (based in fordingbridge) as he can adjust them to fit.

Also agree that ideal saddles are great.
 
Try and get hold of an Ideal WH Saddle, they just seem to fit nearly all foresters. Or Martin Andrew (he's the guy from Fordingbridge isn't he?) could fix you up with the Nathaniel Underwood equivalent which I gather has wider panels underneath. Depends how rich you are feeling...

Another one you could try is the Morris & Nolan native pony saddle (again quite straight cut) which might suit. They are sold by TDS saddlers. I've also seen foresters wearing Calcutt and Forester brand saddles, so perhaps they might be worth trying if you can track one down.

I feel your pain, I ended up having to completely blow my budget and buy brand new saddles for both the kids foresters when we got them several year ago now, we just couldn't find anything second hand that fitted properly. They just had to make do with a borrowed wintec until I could afford to buy brand new.

One place you might try is White Lodge Saddlery in Tiptoe near Lymington to see what secondhand saddles she has in for selling. Perhaps there might be something there that you can borrow to get fitted by your saddler and see if its any good?
 
My friend took a year to find a saddle that fit her NF and also ended up with an Ideal Working Hunter.

As others have said they just seem to fit NF's.

Good luck! :)

Edit - sorry just read your post saying that an Ideal didn't fit. Don't know what else to suggest. Unusual for a NF to have a wither, perhaps that was the problem with the Ideal.
 
If you've tried the Ideal then you might need an even flatter tree, if you can pick up a used 16" Native Pony Fen or M&M it might work - you might need a slighty deeper rear gusset if you have major issues with saddles moving forwards, often caused by saddles being slightly cantle low - the Pheonix Sumphony or the NP Sienna would fit the bill but both are new models and will be hard to pick up used.
 
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