Horse saddles are available in both synthetic materials and in leather, and they should fit both the horse and the rider well for the best riding experience. Choose the highest quality saddle that is still affordable with advice from a riding instructor in this video on equestrian living.
We're going to talk about saddles, particularly the western variety. When we first get into horses there's a whole lot of things we need to learn about the equipment. If we're going to choose a saddle, we might often be kind of persuaded into what we consider synthetic saddles. The material a saddle is made out of is a very important feature. This being of different kinds of synthetic materials and of course our leather saddles that are more traditional. However we can look at some of the benefits of a synthetic saddle, it's not my personal choice but for those starting out and or for someone who has any physical disability whatsoever, a synthetic saddle is a very lightweight saddle. You can get, as this one is, a large seat size, you can get different styles and makes but the synthetic nature of it allows it to be much lighter. You can literally hose it down, they require very little maintenance. However I think the downside of your synthetic variety is they don't really give you that true comfortable feel that you've become used to when you ride in a good quality leather saddle. When we move on to the leather saddles, this is the more traditional. We have different seat varieties, this being one of my youth saddles, it's also we won't go into the type necessarily but you have different skirts, you have square skirts, barrel skirts, your fender size, those kind of things. We want to pick the best saddle that we can afford. That's a tricky decision. Sometimes you can go out and buy a brand new saddle that can be upwards of 4,000 dollars for a highly competitive person. You can find a good quality leather saddle maybe new for a thousand dollars. My best advice is to shop a lot and look for the best quality used saddle for your first saddle. You're going to enjoy your ride much better if you find one that fits you well, fits your horse and has only been lightly used. They are out there, those are my favorite choices. But if you have to go to the new then you want to just think about what is your budget and try to stay within it but find the best quality that you can afford. There are lots of been around forever name brands, those are always very dependable as well as custom made saddles that were made out of somebody's small shop that had a lot of history and reputation.
