www.equinebowensouthafrica.com

14/12/2015

Long day yesterday left home at 6.00AM and got in at 7.00PM after a lovely day saddle checking/fitting somewhere near Okehampton in Devon!!!! Great to see some familiar faces and to meet some new ones, all with their lovely horses.
Many thanks to Tina Fitzgibbon for organising the day 😀😀👍
www.equichanics.co.uk

www.equichanics.co.uk

20/10/2015

A day chilling today after a busy, but thoroughly enjoyable weekend in Noordhoek saddle checking /fitting and reflocking (17) and Bowening horses (7)
Great to see old friends again, and to meet some new ones, all with their lovely horses. I so love what I do..😀😀😀

10/09/2015

Empowering riders and horses. Multidisciplinary yard in PTA East offering stabling lessons & clinics

09/09/2015

Quite a productive day yesterday, Starting off with what should of been a simple job of changing a washer in leaking horse trough. Only to find that the whole ballcock was knackered..so involved a 30 mile round trip to buy a new one, job sorted..
Then home and totally reflock 6 saddles!! fingers are like pin cushions now where I keep stabbing myself with needles :-) Upside of reflocking apart from happy horse backs, is that two more sets of Cair panels have been consigned to the fire.. YEAH!!!

06/09/2015

Well that was a long day, left home at 5.30 AM just got in at 8.45 PM😱😀
Been a great day, spent in Devon and Cornwall with Tamasine Smith, Christine Hall, and her girls, Michelle Heale, Jo Cook, Jane Catherine and Liz, fitting saddles and getting my hands on horses! 13 horses in total😀
A huge well done to Stevie for putting the work in with your two since my last visit, Brilliant to see how much they have changed.... It's results like this make this job so rewarding😀😀😀

08/05/2015

James & Martin, two great grooms at Larane Trakeaner, Bulwer. Both remembered everything they'd been told about the importance of saddle placement. ... The results spoke for themselves... not one sore back on any of the beautiful horses in their care... Well done guys ! Jodi you must be very proud .

26/04/2015

More interesting gullet plates used in Wintec saddles. The only genuine one here is the red one! The green one is supposed to be medium narrow!! But has been widened to match the red Wide one. 😳😞

12/04/2015

Another Hot day, This time in Port Elizabeth, checking and re flocking saddles😀 Good to catch up with old friends and meet some new ones, and as always lots of lovely horses😄

12/04/2015

This poem was prompted by the planting of the 888 246 ceramic poppies at the Tower of London versus the forgotten Horse Memorial which is in tribute to the 300 000 plus horses that perished during the Anglo-Boer War.
The subsequent disrespect has more than exacerbated the difference between those who restore and preserve and those who neglect and destroy.

The Horse Memorial, Port Elizabeth:
By R.E.McLoughlin

lt stands there, still, in bronze on stone
In memory of horses now long gone.
It’s not the soldier bending down
With water bucket near the ground.
No haunting pipes or poppies here
No bugles sound for those that care
For speechless friends that went to war
On little water and mouldy straw.

They knew not who was friend or foe
Or why they would be spurred to go
So fast across the troubled land
Of dusty dams and smouldering sand.
They did not return with medals glowing
Nor marched behind the trumpets blowing
There were no obituaries for those left dying
On arid veld and berg winds sighing.

But somewhere somehow a seed survived
To spawn a mare with rippling pride
That shimmies, canters, jumps with grace
With pretty ladies in the place
Of harden men who went to war
But hold no bucket anymore
For all the horses that once arrived
And the very few that then survived.

10/04/2015

I don't think i have ever been so HOT!! Fitting and reflocking saddles all morning at George riding club its mid 30c and humidity is killing!!!! Thank you Kirstin for the ice creams, ice and lemonade 😄😄

22/03/2015

8.00 AM just finished re flocking a saddle in the back of the Bakkie, at B&B in Fish Hoek stunning morning. 😄

15/03/2015

So yet another interesting Saddle flocking story Australian style..This time with a Bates Cair! saddle.
What this guy did when confronted with a cair saddle that had a collapsed panel, and to save time pulling out staples cutting along the top of the panel in order to get the cair bags out, Then re-stitching panels, flocking panels and stapling back of panel together.
Was to puncture the remaining bags and then flock panels on top of cair bags!!!!
You can see with this cair system the bags are hinged in the middle, so when he flocked it it basically forced the hinge to open this has caused ripples in the leather underside of the panels which is in contact with the horse!! giving any horse the saddle is on to have sore spots..
As can be seen the flocking was put in lumps (or to use the local vernacular Bolletjies!! English friends look it up :-) ) which again is not ideal. :-(
Saddle now re-flocked and ready to fit :-)

12/03/2015

Here at last and its hot!! First thing stop for soft serve ice cream😄 For all my South African friends i have a new number!! Last one got deleted! 0799124485 see you soon 😄😄

11/03/2015

All packed, and so begins the 25 hour journey from home in UK to home in SA.. see you all back in UK in June. Have fun with your horses..:-)

10/03/2015

There's a very good reason why wintec state with their normal model that you should not use a Gullet bar wider than the white!! There is also a very good reason why you should not widen any existing bars..
That reason can be clearly seen in the photos! a home made, widened black Medium bar, Which as you can see when its up against the widest bar that Thorogoods do xxw. is very nearly the same width.
So what happens when you do this, you split the tree!!!! A lot cheaper to use the correct bars etc, than buy a new saddle..
I'm not going to name and shame :-) but this is the second wintec that has been broken doing this!! isn't that right Sarah.:-)

22/02/2015

Just when I think I have seen everything that folks do to the inside of saddles, something worse pops up!! Most people that know me will by now will have picked up that I hate Cair in saddles with a passion.. only surpassed by my loathing of it's predecessor FLAIR!!!..
So I am on a yard yesterday and was asked to look at a saddle with Flair in it. ( A really nice Ideal Jessica dressage that previous owner had had flocking removed and Flair inserted.. I think the following photos will show what a Horlicks the person did when doing this..
None of the air bags had any air in whatsoever, and as you can see in order to get the front bags in they folded them in half!!! with a lump of foam in between, also had two wedges of foam under the bags and a layer on top, and to cap it all off they used flocking as well on top of Bag.
Frigging mindblowing!!!!