Protecting your saddle from water damage

[Crzy4Mares]

Hi folks! I usually live over on the eventing forum, however am hoping to get some advice over here… A group of us are going on a camping trip in a few weeks. I have been to the place before and know that some of the river crossings can get somewhat deep. This year I am riding a pony and we have been getting quite a bit of rain so I’m anticipating that the water will probably be pretty deep for us. Being an English rider, I only have a dressage and jumping saddle. My concern is how to protect my saddle knowing that it will most likely be submerged at some point. My dressage saddle is wool flocked, so I feel that getting soaked could probably cause some internal moisture issues. My jumping saddle does have the Cair air panels, therefore less risk of moisture seeping in.

So my question to you is what kind of products do you use to protect your saddle from water, especially in situations where it could be submerged?

TIA!

[clanter]

just make sure the saddle is completely clean before you go, often when we were showing harness horses in the mud we had to dip the several thousand dollar harnesses in hot water to clean them… we had no side effects as the harness was cleaned often

But… when we started competitive trail riding we bought Wintec synthetic saddles which could be submerged without worry or thought

[jaybird660]

If the saddle does get wet, allow it to dry naturally and clean off any sand and mud. If it is on a stand, just make sure the rails of the stand don’t dent the saddle. If flocked, it should dry out okay and then condition well with a leather balsam of some kind.

[wildlifer]

Cows don’t dissolve. Neither do all the saddles in England and Ireland. Fellow eventer here – your saddle will be just fine, swim away.

As Jay said, just make sure you let it dry (inside is best) if it gets soaked, then clean and condition it and you’re ready to go again.