Horsewright
Knifemaker / Craftsman / Service Provider
- Joined
- Oct 4, 2011
- Messages
- 11,819
As many of you know I've had a new saddle on order for quite a while. Well its showed up Tuesday and WOW!. I've been so busy riding it, I hadn't had a chance to take any pics. Finally did yesterday (Saturday), so here they are:
It's a partial roughout, partial carved saddle. All the carved areas are smooth out. It has an inlaid padded seat with a contrasting water buffalo leather cover. The horn wrap is the same water buffalo.
The carving is an oak and acorn pattern. The fork here, is actually carved once the leather is on the fork. The rest of the carving is done before the leather is on the saddle:
The saddle was made by Porter Rix of Freckers Saddlery. Freckers is a very famous saddle shop and are well known for their saddles. One aspect is that they also make their own trees, the framework that the saddle is built on. This is a little unusual as most saddle makers use a tree made by some one else.
I like the small details like even the latigo keeper is carved, not just marked with the makers mark.
The carving is superb with great depth to it:
Lots of bar backgrounding here!
Love my braided rawhide hobble ring too:
I've never had an inlaid padded seat before, but this old guys pin bones needed one and it makes a difference! The water buffalo inlaid seat:
Nichole's saddle in the background is also a Frecker's (made by Tyler Frecker). Having one already is what convinced me that this is who I wanted to make my next saddle. Besides the obvious extreme quality, one of the things I really liked about her's is that it fit all of our horses well. When I ordered mine I mentioned that and they had me go down to the tack room and look under one of the skirts on her saddle. Stamped there was a code and that told them exactly what tree model it was built on. So they built me the same tree with just a little bigger seat. Mine is a 16 inch seat and Nichole's is 14.75 inch seat. They both fit all our horses very well.
Well having a new saddle ain't much good if ya don't have something to put it on. Bout a month and change back I recently picked up a new 2 year old filly. She had been started and had about 40 rides on her when I got her. She'll be three in a couple of weeks. The young man that started her did a great job on her and I can really say that having started about 2,000 colts my own self over the years, (its what I use to do). He had bought the filly as a yearling out of AZ and then taken her home to ID where she was turned out to pasture. He took a job as one of Doug Williamson's assistants here outside of Bakersfield. Doug is an absolutely LEGENDARY working cowhorse trainer and is featured heavily in the very popular documentary "Down The Fence." If you are stuck in the house during these days and have a couple of hours, watch it. I've seen it five or six times and would watch it again right now. Anyhoo hooked up with this young guy, when we saw he was selling a horse and went and test drove her a couple of times, she passed the vet check with flying colors, we struck a deal and she came home with us. Her name is Lil Sis, well she has a registered name and I can't recall what it is right now and not sure where Nichole stuck her papers, but we call her Lil Sis:
Horsewright water buffalo head stall and water buffalo overlay slobber straps attaching the mecate rein to the snaffle bit:
Backing:
More gratuitous saddle shots. Lil Sis sure has an interesting color.
Playing with the rope. The swinging of the rope bothered her a little so just been gradually exposing her to more and more:
Asked my friend Tyler if he'd sat in my new saddle yet:
So I climbed up on big Dusty Rose for a bit while he gave Lil Sis and my new saddle a cruise:
Sitting on two good uns:
Our horses are all freeze branded. A special branding iron is cooled in liquid nitrogen until Its like 320 degrees below zero. It's then pressed firmly agains the horse for a time based on the color of the horse. This is relatively painless but the horse is sedated so that they don't move around from the pressure of the iron. The vet counted 14 seconds in his head and then removed the iron. The hairs will grow back (over a period of a couple of months) white where she is dark and dark where she is light. By the next day its painless to rub on it, doesn't bother her at all. Lil Sis joining the outfit:
https://www.instagram.com/p/B_sQPHBDec8/
As always questions and comments are welcome. Thanks for looking.
It's a partial roughout, partial carved saddle. All the carved areas are smooth out. It has an inlaid padded seat with a contrasting water buffalo leather cover. The horn wrap is the same water buffalo.
The carving is an oak and acorn pattern. The fork here, is actually carved once the leather is on the fork. The rest of the carving is done before the leather is on the saddle:
The saddle was made by Porter Rix of Freckers Saddlery. Freckers is a very famous saddle shop and are well known for their saddles. One aspect is that they also make their own trees, the framework that the saddle is built on. This is a little unusual as most saddle makers use a tree made by some one else.
I like the small details like even the latigo keeper is carved, not just marked with the makers mark.
The carving is superb with great depth to it:
Lots of bar backgrounding here!
Love my braided rawhide hobble ring too:
I've never had an inlaid padded seat before, but this old guys pin bones needed one and it makes a difference! The water buffalo inlaid seat:
Nichole's saddle in the background is also a Frecker's (made by Tyler Frecker). Having one already is what convinced me that this is who I wanted to make my next saddle. Besides the obvious extreme quality, one of the things I really liked about her's is that it fit all of our horses well. When I ordered mine I mentioned that and they had me go down to the tack room and look under one of the skirts on her saddle. Stamped there was a code and that told them exactly what tree model it was built on. So they built me the same tree with just a little bigger seat. Mine is a 16 inch seat and Nichole's is 14.75 inch seat. They both fit all our horses very well.
Well having a new saddle ain't much good if ya don't have something to put it on. Bout a month and change back I recently picked up a new 2 year old filly. She had been started and had about 40 rides on her when I got her. She'll be three in a couple of weeks. The young man that started her did a great job on her and I can really say that having started about 2,000 colts my own self over the years, (its what I use to do). He had bought the filly as a yearling out of AZ and then taken her home to ID where she was turned out to pasture. He took a job as one of Doug Williamson's assistants here outside of Bakersfield. Doug is an absolutely LEGENDARY working cowhorse trainer and is featured heavily in the very popular documentary "Down The Fence." If you are stuck in the house during these days and have a couple of hours, watch it. I've seen it five or six times and would watch it again right now. Anyhoo hooked up with this young guy, when we saw he was selling a horse and went and test drove her a couple of times, she passed the vet check with flying colors, we struck a deal and she came home with us. Her name is Lil Sis, well she has a registered name and I can't recall what it is right now and not sure where Nichole stuck her papers, but we call her Lil Sis:
Horsewright water buffalo head stall and water buffalo overlay slobber straps attaching the mecate rein to the snaffle bit:
Backing:
More gratuitous saddle shots. Lil Sis sure has an interesting color.
Playing with the rope. The swinging of the rope bothered her a little so just been gradually exposing her to more and more:
Asked my friend Tyler if he'd sat in my new saddle yet:
So I climbed up on big Dusty Rose for a bit while he gave Lil Sis and my new saddle a cruise:
Sitting on two good uns:
Our horses are all freeze branded. A special branding iron is cooled in liquid nitrogen until Its like 320 degrees below zero. It's then pressed firmly agains the horse for a time based on the color of the horse. This is relatively painless but the horse is sedated so that they don't move around from the pressure of the iron. The vet counted 14 seconds in his head and then removed the iron. The hairs will grow back (over a period of a couple of months) white where she is dark and dark where she is light. By the next day its painless to rub on it, doesn't bother her at all. Lil Sis joining the outfit:
https://www.instagram.com/p/B_sQPHBDec8/
As always questions and comments are welcome. Thanks for looking.
