Soft swelling after riding on her back

[Madasmaz]

Hi,

I have recently returned to using my Albion GP (correctly fitted) after a disastrous trial of a treeless saddle that resulted in lumping under my seat bones. Now I have a soft swelling directly across her back just infront of the stirrup bars which first appeared on the 30th May when we did a 6 hour hack (by accident). Are there ligaments that span the top of the back bone, and could it be that it is getting a bit pinched? Cold hosing gets rid of it, but it always comes back if she gets hot in her work (unavoidable at the moment). I am using a sheepskin under her saddle now, and am wondering whether to combine it with a thinline pad, or do I just give her another 6 weeks off and start again slowly?

 

[kerilli]

how big is the swelling? is it just across the top of the spine? i'd bin the sheepskin and stick a prolite under, definitely... my saddler is heavily involved with pliance testing (pressure testing) and says they get by far the best results with prolite, esp compared to sheepskin.
if it's just across the spine, and quite small (about an inch or so across, total?) my mare gets it too... it's a slightly weakened blood vessel which leaks slightly. the pressure from the saddle on either side of the spine makes it leak, and the area fills with blood like a little balloon... there is no pain on palpation, and after a little while (about an hour in my mare's case) the swelling dissipates naturally. it looks worse than it is, kind of thing.
of course, if there is pain on palpation with your mare's lump, that's a different matter. must admit, Albions are not my favourite saddles...

 

[GoJo]

agree on the albion thing- not my favourite either. i used to get this with my old saddle (and i had a prolite numnah under it) . changed to a wintec and its gone. the lump was hot to the touch and squishy - no pain reaction and only on his off side - slighlty to the right of the spine. he didnt have any time off and he does 2/3 hour hacks 4 times a week and we havent had any more problems.

 

[Madasmaz]

Sounds just like that, no pain associated, just a liquidy swelling. I have also been given a comfort zone pad with lambs wool lining to try. I have an Albion because my pony has very big shoulders and so to allow movement needs a tree with points that slope backwards..which is what they do. Sheepskin also allows more movement in shoulder and she seems really happy in it for a ladette type. Have been told a Jeffries event saddle may be a better fit, however, I never had any issues with my saddle until I tried a treeless, which was to try and remove the need for reflocking when she gains/looses weight, being a good-dooer it can be quite tricky to manage. Now I have all sorts of issues cropping up.

 

[Madasmaz]

Had a chat with my saddler this morning, he, incidentally chaired the SMS for many years and BETA and still lectures on saddle fitting, so he is one of the top guys in the UK, fault him and you can forget the rest. Anyhow, he seems to think that it could be caused by one of 2 things...lateral movement of the saddle, or dorsal process squeeze which could be caused by the numnah being pulled down and stretched across her back. First I need to use a slightly thicker numnah to rule out the lateral movement, and if that is not the issue, to try no numnah at all. In the meantime, I am getting a thin line pad, as the prolite pad I have is too thick.