WOW Saddlery Canberra

15/04/2024

Girths For Sale: WOW H girths concentrate the pressure away from the horses pectoral muscles and onto the sternum allowing for greater comfort and freedom of movement.

New WOW Vegan Black Soft H 24”/26” $400
Used WOW Leather Black Soft H 28”/30” $300
Used WOW Leather Brown Soft H 26”/26” $250
Used WOW Leather Black H 26”/26” $300
Used Fairfax Performance Leather Brown 28” $275

13/03/2024

Exciting Announcement!!!

I am absolutely delighted to share this with you.

Today I proudly became a Wow saddle ambassador.

I am very grateful for the opportunity to work with Aviar and Masters saddles Ltd have been super but both horses needed something different…

Today David Kempsell and Anneliese Lewis came to assess and fit both horses and I have to say I was completely blown away….

Firstly by the science behind the saddles

Secondly, the methodology and tech involved in the fitting the saddle to the horse and getting the girthing just right

Thirdly, the care and attention to get the balance right for me

Finally - the results! Well what can I say other than…..WOW!

Avalon was calm, rideable, forward, loose - her controls felt so direct and light it was just awesome!

Boris….flippin heck!! His panel shape is designed to support his weak area which is his back and allow him to really engage the engine - I will share more details of each specific saddle but I can’t believe the freedom of his movement - he has to now learn how to deal with all this range of movement and I have to learn how to ride him again!

I rode in a much older Wow about 15 years ago and I didn’t fall in love with it - today I expected it to be good but I expected it to feel a bit wooly and indirect - I couldn’t have been more wrong. I was wrong with quite a lot of things today including what I expected to fit the horses and that is not a negative at all - it’s a great and inspiring feeling….because tomorrow I am starting the day not wrong! We have moved forward and we start strong!

I am so excited to be working with WOW Saddles - I’m buzzing and hungry to learn more and will enjoy this journey immensely

I literally can’t rave about them enough.

Here is Boris enjoying his new hind leg! 😂

www.wowsaddles.com

15/01/2024

Superstar Igor wins the 1.30 convincingly today Bury Farm Equestrian Village !
Developing into a very competitive horse !

07/01/2024

WOW Dressage Saddle: size 0 (16”) Extra Deep Seat on a curved tree with quilted stitch cantle infill; wide gullet panels with a stitchline and standard gusset, exquisite Fixed Block flaps with padded embossed brown leather. Rare find $4500.

21/12/2023

I can’t believe I ever tolerated horses being hard to catch.

Not in the “they’re bad horses with an attitude and shouldn’t get away with that” way but because I can’t believe I was okay with my mere presence being so aversive and unpleasant that horses would run the other way when they saw me.

I can’t believe that I used to respond with frustration and irritation, angry at them for defying me and making my day harder, instead of being disappointed in myself for not having developed a more symbiotic relationship with them.

Hard to catch horses are relatively common and often viewed through the lens of being naughty when really it’s a sign that they associate humans with highly unpleasant tasks that they would really like to avoid.

A horse being hard to catch says everything we need to know about their association with training and calls for immediate reevaluation of the way we do things with them.

Horses being happy to see people, meeting them at the gate and being excited to be caught is a sign of pleasant association with training.

Horses who actively try to avoid their handlers, especially to the point of running and expending excess precious energy simply to evade what they view as a threat, should be a glaring red flag that exposes how the horse views human beings.

How our horses respond to us tells us a story we may or may not want to hear, but it’s an honest one nonetheless.

09/12/2023

And Freedom for Discomfort is of course a well fitting saddle

The five basic freedoms of animal welfare are what is considered to be the “bare minimum” when it comes to when needs to be provided to promote wellbeing.

They are as follows:

1. Freedom from Hunger and Thirst.

2. Freedom from Discomfort. (Providing appropriate environment with shelter)

3. Freedom from Pain, Injury or Disease.

4. Freedom to Express Normal Behaviour. (Normal behaviour for horses includes socialization, play, mutual grooming, group naps, lengthy times spent foraging, adequate movement)

5. Freedom from Fear and Distress.

On an international scale, on many accounts, it is fully legal to not provide horses with all of these freedoms.

Most horses have freedom # 1 , but that’s where things start to get murky.

Freedom from discomfort could also be taken as the discomfort that could come with being a herd animal who is isolated and confined for 20+ hours a day, even if there is shelter.

The discomfort that it causes an animal made to basically be perpetually moving with other horses to be forced to stand within the walls of a 12x12 box is substantial. This also predisposes horses to physically uncomfortable ailments like ulcers.

If horses go anywhere from 4-6 hours without hay, their stomach will start to ulcerate, this could also be regarded as a form of discomfort or as not fulfilling Freedom # 3.

As per studies like Dr. Sue Dyson’s ridden pain and lameness studies, ~40% of ridden horses display some form of lameness, suggesting many horses don’t have freedom from pain.

Lots of horse owners are unable to read horse behaviour due to it not being properly taught, meaning they often miss out on what their horse is trying to say.

Pain or stress related behaviours are often mistook for “naughty” behaviour and punished accordingly.

Freedom # 4, in my opinion, is the most commonly unfulfilled need in the horse.

As a herd animal, being near other horses near constantly and actually being able to have physical contact with other horses is a need.

Social needs account for a generous portion of equine wellbeing and there is extensive evidence of how complete isolation damages welfare substantially.

Many horses are kept in complete isolation from other horses, the closest form of socialization they receive being seeing other horses from across a fenceline where they cannot even touch noses.

I did this to my first horse for YEARS. He was utterly deprived of social connection and I was none the wiser to the damage I was doing because I was taught it was okay.

Horses are also trickle feeding grazers. They’re meant to move A LOT and cover a lot of distance.

While providing them with massive acreages worldwide may be difficult, I do think we need to consider the fact that it isn’t fair on a welfare perspective if they’re kept in such small spaces that the only time they get to go above a walk or a trot is when they’re ridden.

They deserve space to engage in autonomous movement, this is a natural behaviour.

Enrichment in stalls and small paddocks can help to better fulfil these needs by giving horses more control to influence their environment but it cannot replace socialization and autonomous movement completely.

Lastly, Freedom # 5. Many horses do not have this freedom as it is still super accepted to deliberately traumatize horses in training.

The fact that people can post videos of them training horses so aggressively that they flip them over or the horse tries to jump out of a round pen, so desperate to escape, and have people laugh at it with them is an example of how many humans aren’t aware of the trauma they may be inflicting on horses.

It isn’t realistic to provide a completely fear free life but if we can lower stress in training, we should. Many choose not to do this due to not wanting to have to learn new methods.

We shouldn’t just accept having perpetually stressed horses. Stress is unpleasant for any creature, we need to value comfort in training more.

I don’t think it’s unreasonable to say that we should move towards a reality where these 5 freedoms are used as a guideline for welfare and where boarding facilities are held to similar standards as zoos, in which they are required to fulfil a certain number of minimum standards in order to remain open.

This should honestly be the bare minimum.

Having public facilities have to fulfil basic welfare requirements allows owners more options in being able to find better care for their horses and it holds facilities accountable by ensuring they are set up to appropriately manage the animals they intend to keep.

This really should not be a controversial statement as most horse people I’ve spoken to are able to see the poor welfare in unregulated zoos and in other care with more exotic animals.

The horse industry has just had a certain level of care so normalized that complacency has developed.

Minimum welfare standards would be a win for everyone by allowing horse owners more freedom in selecting ethical care practices for their horses by pushing more public facilities to provide them due to it being legally necessary.

The discussion on how to fulfil all 5 freedoms on less space, in urban environments, needs to happen but that doesn’t change the fact that ALL of these freedoms must be fulfilled in order to practice good welfare.

Can the horse industry agree that there needs to be a certain set of minimum standards met to quantify adequate care?

Welfare can’t just be about providing food/water to sustain life but not providing enough to psychologically sustain adequate mental health or allow existence without pain and excess stress.

07/12/2023

Offer available now until March 2024.
Includes existing new stock.
T’s&C’s apply.

07/12/2023

This might be an unpopular opinion that will rattle some but I think it’s an important one…

The extent to which horse owners feel the need to bubble wrap their horses, I think, stems from how common it is to, well, not let horses be horses…

Horses who grow up having virtually no time in a herd…

Horses who grow up only ever getting to autonomously move on perfectly manicured, flat ground in a small paddock…

Horses who don’t have the space to go faster than a walk or trot unless, of course, it is when they’re under saddle and being piloted by a person…

How can they be expected to NOT be accident prone when they’ve not been allowed to live a life that’s autonomous enough to learn some self preservation?

How are they supposed to know how to move in a way to prevent injury when they aren’t exposed to different terrains, or allowed to self exercise in larger areas?

How can they learn how to coexist in herds without picking fights without developing social skills?

Or, how can they even share fence lines without causing problems if they haven’t learned how to properly communicate with other horses due to being deprived of opportunities to learn how to do so?

Even outside of learned behaviours within the brain, the body (especially the hoof and soft tissues) can’t really condition itself to withstand forces that it was never exposed to.

Movement of the body is absolutely crucial to building soundness in addition to allowing the brain to learn about the environment.

The most accident prone horses I consistently encounter are the ones who have had a history of not being allowed to be horses.

The ones who have existed in herds 24/7 for all of, or most of, their lives tend to have the least amount of issues.

Sure, accidents can still happen, but I would be lying if I didn’t admit that this observation wasn’t becoming exceedingly more obvious to me the more I’ve moved away from being the exact type of person to bubble wrap the crap out of my horses.

The more nice allowed them to learn how to safely exist as horses are intended, the less I find myself worrying about them.

The sight of my horse running across the field, as horses do, used to frighten me because I would worry about imminent injury…

But then I would canter them at courses of jumps and ask them far more physically demanding things, without fear, because I was in control.

And sadly, it’s been far too recently I’ve realized this.

07/12/2023

Kristy Koch and ESB Golden Sun (Sunny) looking the biz in their WOW Dressage Saddle with H Girth whilst competing in the 95cm Class at Bodangora Horse Trials over the weekend.

Kirsty tells us she was pleased with Sunny’s relaxed test putting them into 5th place going into the next phase - remaining in 5th place overall after a bold and confident XC run clear and under time. Well done!

Natalie James, Hunter based WOW Fitter and Retailer, manages Kristy and Sunny’s saddle fitting - clearly with good effect.

Contact Natalie through this page for your demo ride.

Photos taken by Britt Grovenor Photography

01/12/2023

To pad or not to pad, that is the question..

There are so many different saddle- and half pads available – each of which serving a myriad of purposes – beyond simply being an interface between your saddle and the horse’s back. Saddle pads can be heat-deflecting, sweat-absorbing, pressure-distributing, saddle-balancing, rider-cushioning, you name it. They generate an astonishing amount of revenue within the equine industry, and when it comes to overall unit sales, are probably among the top sellers in any tack shop.

One of the reasons for their growing popularity – aside from being used to accessorize – is simply that there are so many poorly fitting saddles.

Saddle pads or half pads more specifically, are still widely seen as a low-expense band-aid solution for poor fit. However, fixing fit problems with saddle pads and shims should always be an interim solution, and only when their use doesn’t impact the gullet angle and width, or impact the gullet channel width for the spine.

But why do we use saddle pads in the first place?

The original use of the saddle pad was as a thin interface between saddle and horse to keep the sweat off the leather, that’s it!

The function of a saddle pad is based partly on the style of the saddle it was made for.
To explain this further, we will categorize between two types of saddles:

The first includes those saddles such as military, pack, and Western saddles, where the saddle tree is in direct contact with the horse’s back. For these types of saddles, a saddle pad is absolutely necessary as padding to keep the tree from directly contacting the horse’s back. Originally, it was a rolled wool blanket folded and used under a saddle, or a pad made of felt was called into service to keep the horse’s back comfortable. Nowadays there are other materials to pad these types of saddles.

The second type of saddle has a fairly flat saddle tree with attached panels containing flocking made of wool, felt, rubber, air, or a synthetic wool mix. These saddles really do not need any type of pad to ensure the horse’s comfort, that is, if they fit properly!
Saddle pads for these saddles are really only supposed to be protection from rub marks arising from dirt or sweat, and also to protect the saddle’s leather from the horse’s sweat.

Often pads are used as a temporary expedient to assist in proper fit, but the important word here is temporary. Even the best saddle pad in the world is not a good substitute for regular saddle-fit adjustments.

It is important to make sure that the saddle pad does not impact the positive designs of the saddle. It shouldn’t interfere with the width of the gullet channel (thus pinching the spinal vertebrae and dorsal-ligament system), nor should it “pull” or pinch over the wither. It should lie flat and without folds under the saddle. Therefore, it is important that the saddle- or half pad follows the shape of the horse’s back, we call this “wither-relief”. Unfortunately oftentimes saddle pads are too straight and even when pulled up into the gullet channel during tacking up, they will migrate down against the horse’s withers and spine during riding, creating pressure points.

Many saddle pads are thick and cushiony and therefore change the three-dimensional, saddle-support area of the horse: In effect, they negate any saddle-fitting work that has been done or reduce the gullet channel clearance.

When the saddle fits the horse, only one pad is needed: A thin cotton wither-relief pad.

What saddle- or half pad do you use and why?

01/12/2023

Excellent price

24/11/2023

07/11/2023