Talk:Saddle

message: After mentioning the recent addition of "Parts of the Saddle" on User talk:Eventer, I've been pondering.  Perhaps this page should be moved to Saddle (disambiguation), and a more generic article on saddles can be written here?  Perhaps it could discuss things that are common to all saddles, and use one-paragraph summary sections on English saddle and Western saddle (for example) linked with .
A lot of the incoming links are just about "saddles" in general -- when a Simpsons episode talks about a saddle, they don't care whether it's an English or Western one, and someone clicking a link from that article shouldn't be presented with a disambiguation page.
In fact, I think I've just convinced myself that this is necessary.  Barring any disagreement here, I'll take care of it in the next day or two.  — Catherine\talk 21:01, 9 August 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Move this page

message: Hey, I'll be happy to help contribute to the saddle article once the moves have been made. I have some resonably good sources which should help. -Eventer
:All right, I've created a skeleton for you -- only the bare minimum of information about specific saddles should go here; this should just concentrate on information common to all saddles.  See Wikipedia:Citing sources for more information on providing references, and let me know if there's anything more I can help with.  Thanks for volunteering to knock this into shape!  — Catherine\talk 18:00, 10 August 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Generic Saddle Article

message: There is content about saddles on both Saddle and Horse tack. I don't think that we can merge these two pages 100% (since there's content on both that doesn't relate to the other subject), but I think we need to at least cross-reference the two and remove unnecessary redundancies. -- 201.50.123.251 18:54, 22 August 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: This used to be a disambiguation page (now at Saddle (disambiguation)), and it's just recently become its own article; Eventer has been doing some excellent work here.  I think much of the info at Horse tack could be moved here, leaving behind a summary section there like those for Stirrup and Bridle.  (See Wikipedia:Summary style.)  — Catherine\talk 20:00, 22 August 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Merge: [[Horse tack]]

message: There needs to be rather more than this one sentence. In particular, how we know wbout this saddle, the Connolly reconstruction, and where it came from (Gaul, apparently). I will try to add some of this. --Nantonos 22:09, 28 September 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Sounds like this could be a whole new article.  I think I will take this bit and the McClellan bit, put into a nes section on "historic" saddles, and people who want more than a sentence or two summary can link to a new article they create on the subject.  How's that sound? Montanabw 03:20, 29 September 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Roman saddle

message: [] -- This is an article about the saddles that Native Americans used as described by Lewis and Clark.  Interestingly, young men did not use a hard saddle, but rather a leather pillow stuffed with hair.-- Puddytang 17:17, 3 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Varies depending on tribal group. Intothatdarkness (talk) 13:54, 30 May 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Native American Saddles 

message: I wonder, that there is nothing about saddle fitting like here and the problems with non-fitting saddles. --Wertzu 08:16, 17 April 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: This article is so generic, and mostly historical, it probably doesn't fit here, but perhaps the western saddle could use such a section. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Montanabw (talk • contribs) 15:47, 17 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Fitting 

message: It looks like this article needs some information on saddles for animals other than horses, as mentioned in the first line of the article. I also think that "and be comfortable for both horse and rider", from the treeless saddle controversy section, is biased. The section also cites no references. And perhaps treeless saddles deserve their own article? I am a lemon 06:56, 18 June 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: The treeless saddle probably would benefit from its own article, with just a mention here.  I tried to tone down the original anti-treeless editor's rant by creating the controversies section, but it could probably use more work.  I'll look it over.  As for other animals, if someone has expertise and wants to add a section, that would be cool.  So far apparently we don't have any wikipedians who are interested, but a section on, say, camel saddles, would be rather nice to see. Montanabw 16:20, 18 June 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Problems 

message: I don't think that any police use the military saddles that were used in the wars. I have a photo of one. Comments please.Cgoodwin (talk) 01:51, 20 March 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: Not sure.  Probably most "war" saddles are now antiques.  Not sure if still using some of the old basic designs or not.  Any info you can find would be groovy.  Montanabw(talk) 05:38, 22 March 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: I have added info on these saddles at:  Please ammend as neccessary. There does not appear to be a police saddle as such. Europe using European saddles; AUS their own saddles or European saddles etc.Cgoodwin (talk) 23:10, 25 March 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: In the states, models similar to these are sometimes marketed as "Police" saddles. I really don't know that much about them.  In the USA, they kept the McClellan model quite a while, maybe to the end, but I can't say I know what was used post WWI, here, though, without doing some research.   However, I have seen mounted USA police in English saddles, western saddles, "police" saddles, you name it, much variation by region.   Are you thinking of making a military saddle section in this article, or just adding the paragraphs you have created to the existing list? The basic outline looks pretty good to me, just be careful of adding something too long to the laundry list, maybe a new section (as exists for English, western, etc. has) is the best approach.  I trust you, do what works.  Montanabw(talk) 03:07, 26 March 2009 (UTC)
thread_title: Military saddles

message: whats the difference between the english and western besides the obvious. who did they come from--Brent Perry 19:51, 20 August 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: I think the respective articles on each saddle cover the history in more detail. Click the wikilinks and feel free to comment there if we need to expand them more.  Montanabw(talk) 23:35, 21 August 2009 (UTC)
thread_title:  Whats the difference 

message: Lets get this article unblocked and end this so we can get back to business, I suggest that we place the links that you object to in some other section instead of "see also" and that you drop your argument against inline links to Commons images for terms in the "Japanese saddle" section until the time that there are articles on Wikipedia to link directly to.
"It is one thing to take useful photos and use them to illustrate articles;"  That is exactly what I am doing here and nothing else, there is no AGENDA here except helping people gain knowledge and understanding and SHARING with people.Samuraiantiqueworld (talk) 22:19, 29 July 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: I second unblocking the article and coming to some sort of reasonable conclusion. David Straub (talk) 08:57, 30 July 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: I support your two proposals, David, as this is, I think, all that is at issue. Montanabw(talk) 18:01, 1 August 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: Montanabw, I suggest the you ask for the article to be unblocked then, I realize that you are quite active in horse related articles but I am also, I specialize in Japanese and samurai horse related research and I am not interested in changing articles, just ADDING additional information on the subject. I am sure you realize that the majority of articles on the subject currently are slanted towards the western use of horses and understandably so do the lack of available research of the subject from other cultures. I am just adding a few sentences with references, images etc on the appropriate horse related articles and this should not be mis-construed as me adding a personal point of view on the subject. As for writing additional articles..well that would be the eventual solution but I am currently working on MANY badly written unreferenced articles (look at the Japanese and samurai related weapons and armour articles) already as well as researching correct terms for items and purchasing rare items so that I can photograph them and make the images available for use. I have organized and created many categories on Wikipedia commons and added many images (and terms) which were not previously available for public use any were. Hopefully you will see that I am (not of that ilk!!!) and I am just as interested in adding to the available information on the subject as you are, in addition you might actually learn something you did not already know.Samuraiantiqueworld (talk) 01:44, 2 August 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: Saumrai, read WP:UNDUE and WP:SOAP before you next reply. Also WP:AGF.   I, and the others on wikipedia, are not at all opposed to adding relevant material to an overview article, and here many of your substantive content edits were useful, but just a little too much, and then you were edit-warring over links and MOS issues.  And you apparently see others as abrasive and rude to you but do not recognize the abrasiveness and rudeness in yourself.   For example, comments like "you might actually learn something" are completely out of line and very unhelpful.  What you need to understand is that Japan may have developed some pretty cool-looking saddles, but the point here is not to discuss every single style of saddle in the world, but to focus on the aspects of technology and improvement in history, note significant contributions, and to provide information on the most common present uses.  Montanabw(talk) 04:14, 2 August 2011 (UTC)

text: Also, if you have no interest in actually writing any new articles on your areas of interest, that is sad, as they are probably needed and would be valuable.  Sometimes an overview article is insufficient to cover a topic. For example, though I hesiitate to send you to yet another article since you've been behaving in a problematic manner at every place I've encountered you so far, nonetheless, I AM going to assume good faith on your part, and do it anyway:  Look at another example: the bit (horse) article is, at most, an overview that leads to multiple specialty articles.  Then one of those, the curb bit article, could not adequately cover a historically unique variant, so I created spade bit (horse).  On the other hand, someone tried to spin off weymouth bit, but it was re-merged because it was just another term for an ordinary English curb, and there wasn't enough that was unique enough for a new article (at least, not yet). So you could do the same with your Japanese saddles, your existing summary is a good lead in to another article that covers the topic in depth. Montanabw(talk) 04:14, 2 August 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: You call it an "overview" article, which is what it was supposed to be but take a GOOD look at it now, look at the majority of the sections, The Middle Ages, Parts of an equestrian saddle, English saddle, Stock saddles, Military saddles all about western or European saddles as opposed to a few sentences that I added on Japanese saddles. "Parts of an equestrian saddle", should be called "Parts of an Occidental equestrian saddle" there are other types of equestrian saddles, and 10 out of 14 images are of Western or European saddles. The Japanese saddle has its own list of parts, why should I not add a "Parts of the Japanese saddle" section in the article? If you really want a pure "overview" article then a lot of the text in this article should be moved to articles on "European" and "Western" saddles instead of being given EXTRA WEIGHT in this article. You also like to throw Wikipedia policy out, well how about the policy on INLINE CITATIONS????  How is it that this article is almost completely unreferenced with some sections having no references at all, is not references one of the key Wikipedia policies?  Where did I say that I had NO interest in writing an article? I said that I was currently FIXING articles that various editors wrote with little to no references, including this article. Samuraiantiqueworld (talk) 04:57, 2 August 2011 (UTC)
thread_title: solution

message: Good article on saddles in other parts of the world http://westernhorseman.com/index.php/articles/gear-guide/article/565-saddles-of-the-world.html  Montanabw(talk) 23:39, 10 October 2011 (UTC)
thread_title:  Future ref 

message: I just came over from visiting the PETA site, and was wondering if (almost) all horse saddles are still made of leather.  I would guess that there is some pressure to move to using more synthetics, but I didn't see any mention of that here. Mwr0 (talk) 13:52, 12 March 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: Overwhelmingly still leather. Synthetic materials are better than they used to be, and getting more common with cheaper saddles, but there really hasn't been a replacement for leather to a significant degree.  Montanabw(talk) 15:42, 13 March 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: I sign Montanabw's statement. At least in my part of the world there is absolutely no "pressure" to move to synthetics. The upside to synthetic saddles is lightness, but few people prefer the "cheap" look and feel to them. I would say there's a large proportion in synthetic children's and pony saddles, in part due to cost, but high-quality saddles are still overwhelmingly leather. Nimloth250 (talk) 09:14, 29 January 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: To put it upside down - I would actually say "is the use of synthetics vs. leather steady or declining?" and put a finger on declining. There was a craze for synthetic saddles when they were first invented, but in what I can see these days that popularity is quickly waning. Nimloth250 (talk) 09:19, 29 January 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: Looks like a dead issue.  I think you are close, but as we probably can't find RS stats either way, I'm not going to fret about adding much to the article.  Montanabw(talk) 00:55, 31 January 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Is the use of leather (vs. synthetics) steady or declining? 

message: References MUST pass the validity requirements of Wikipedia, I have asked for an opinion of this type of reference Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard/Archive 123, it does not matter whether an article is stable or not, they are not valid references and these types of references are not allowed to remain as references on Wikipedia articles as was implied on my talk page ("Please do not remove sources as you did on the article saddle. In a longterm stable article such as this, it is more helpful to tag problematic links and allow them to be fixed. Please respect the process. Montanabw"). This type of reference can be placed in an external links category if they are not commercial links. If there is any doubt as to the validity of any references I have removed take it to Wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard as I did, removing invalid references is NOT vandalism.Samuraiantiqueworld (talk) 23:05, 27 May 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: MTBW recruited a budddy to help here, and in one of the more bizarre instances of meatpuppetry I've seen, User:Nyttend returned the removed sources with the edit summary: "Are any of these reliable sources? They don't look like it". In other words, xe agreed with User:Samuraiantiqueworld  while undoing his edits. You can't make this stuff up. Joefromrandb (talk) 00:23, 28 May 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: I will AGF here and assume Nyttend's edits were not meatpuppetry (although playing the admin card wasn't really necessary). Basically it seems that Nyttend had it backwards at first, and agrees that the links that Samuraiantiqueworld removed were removed correctly. Even though xe doesn't want to get involved, I would appreciate it if Nyttend, as an administrator, would second my statement that User:Montanabw's use of Twinkle to revert 7 good-faith edits as "vandalism" was entirely unacceptable. Joefromrandb (talk) 00:56, 28 May 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: Excuse me, but the seven edits REMOVED links with no discussion or explanation.  The links were old and I have no argument that better sources are preferred, but the solution is NOT to just randomly remove things, but is to go find those better sources and put them in.  (Which was eventually done, actually).  Per WP:RS, first you need a source, and ideally you want sources that are as high quality as possible, but you don't just randomly remove links because one editor feels they are no good, and especially you don't move them to an external links section where they are removed from their context.  Better policy is to point out the problem via a tag such as , , ,  or something similar.  Just tossing them makes more work for everyone.  And on that note, my reverts were far from indefensible; the lack of collaboration that occurred with the removal of sources from an article was the problem and a full-scale revert was appropriate.  And frankly, with 3000 articles now on my watchlist, it is more than fine with me if people improve articles; makes less work for others.  But the operative word is "improve."  Montanabw(talk) 22:45, 30 May 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  references 

message: In the third paragraph of the History and Development section appears the clause, "reducing the force directed on any one part of the horse's back (lb/sq. in. or kg/sq. cm)": this is a misuse of the term "force". In a casual context such as this it's not really important, but the introduction of units, albeit with no actual quantities, implies that someone was thinking about this and wanted to get it right, but had a bit pf physics trouble. This is a small enough edit that I will go ahead and just make it; I'm sure someone will inform me if I'm wrong. Scutigera (talk) 14:23, 13 November 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: Maybe wikilink to the concept if you haven't done so already.  Whatever is the right way to phrase pounds of pressure or weight per square inch, the importance is that the solid treed saddle allowed horses to carry more weight on their backs for longer periods; whatever gets us there!  :-)  Montanabw(talk) 22:26, 13 November 2012 (UTC)
replies: text:  I linked to the definition of "pressure", and so I'm puzzled to find that the re-edit of my edit restored the original conceptual error, though the phrasing is better: "pressure per unit of area" is redundant, as pressure is force per unit of area; a rider in a proper saddle exerts the same force on the horse, but less pressure; note that "pounds" in the example unit "pounds per square inch" is a unit of force and "square inch" is a unit of area. Still, I'm a science guy, not a saddle guy, so I'll stay out of this one; I've said my piece. Scutigera (talk) 20:14, 16 November 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: I'm OK if you want to refine the phrasing a little more to use language that is correct from a physics point of view, I have no problem with that, so long as it is put so non-physicist can understand it (smile). Perhaps before you do, peek at  this article which is about a study of the question of how a treed saddle works to distribute a rider's weight better than do so-called "treeless" saddles, so you have an idea of what they are doing in various studies. I understand that "pounds per square inch" is awkward, but I'm looking for something easy for laypeople to understand --  Maybe we just need to discuss kilopascals???  Here's the point of this section, however we get there:  there is a school of thought that believes it is better for the horse to ride it bareback or with a soft "treeless" saddle, but studies have shown that doing so is actually harder on a horse's back than riding with a properly-fitted saddle, because the rider's weight is concentrated at the seat bones, putting more weight in a much smaller area of a horse's back, leading to a greater risk of muscular pain and soreness.  The solid-treed saddle was invented for a reason: so a horse can carry more weight for more time, and with less fatigue to the rider as well. Obviously, a poorly-fitted saddle is bad, but this deosn't mean all saddles are bad, they serve an important purpose for the things we ask horses to do.  An analogy is that poorly-fitted shoes on people are also bad, but just because early homo sapiens ran barefoot doesn't mean we go barefoot in the modern world! Montanabw(talk) 22:40, 16 November 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: That sounds fair. I'd like to change "reducing the pressure per unit of area (e.g. pounds per square inch) on any one part of the horse's back" to either "reducing the pressure (e.g. pounds per square inch) on any one part of the horse's back" or "reducing the force per unit of area (e.g. pounds per square inch) on any one part of the horse's back"; these are equivalent, and while the first is shorter, the second is more explicit. You have a closer affinity with this article than I do; which works best for you? Scutigera (talk) 01:33, 18 November 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: I'd say either is fine; do what is correct in the world of physics, with appropriate linking.  Either way, the "e.g." parenthetical should make it clear to the layperson. Maybe, given that the researchers are going this way, work in a link to kilopascals too, I'm all for new vocabulary words!  ;-)  Montanabw(talk) 21:38, 19 November 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: Done. I went with "pressure" rather than "force per unit of area"; "pressure" has already been used in the discussion and "force per unit of area" adds terminology that I think breaks up the flow of what is, after all, a history article. I added the link for "pounds per square inch" to the already-extant one for "pressure" in case anyone really wants to go into those. Scutigera (talk) 04:42, 20 November 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: Works for me, I added kilopascals too, so we have both Imperial and metrics for those who care (some do, some a great deal) and for possiblebenefit if adding more stuff on modern studies to the article later.  Montanabw(talk) 22:53, 20 November 2012 (UTC)
thread_title: Force/Pressure confusion in History and Development

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thread_title:  External links modified 

message: The article uses the word "tree" all over the place, but never defines it. There's even sections on "treeless" saddles, but they never talk about what's missing. A clear definition of "tree", early in the article, would be very helpful. -- Dan Griscom (talk) 11:25, 26 September 2017 (UTC)
replies: text: Good point.  Have also been thinking about creating saddle tree for awhile.  Montanabw(talk) 08:34, 1 October 2017 (UTC)
thread_title:  What the heck is a "tree"?