The skin under the saddle does not lie

The skin under the saddle tells you about fit long before the back does. How to read white hairs, dry patches and girth pressure while they are still small.

There are two seconds after you dismount in which the horse tells you everything you need to know about your saddle. You lift it off, the back steams, and the sweat pattern shows where there was pressure and where there was none. Then the numnah is carried off and it has gone.

Skin is the first tissue to report a badly fitting saddle, and the last one anybody believes.

White hairs are a receipt

If a patch of white hairs appears in the saddle area, there was pressure there. Follicles squeezed over a long period grow the hair back without colour, and they tend to keep doing it. This is not age and not a quirk of the coat. The patches usually sit behind the withers, or singly where the edge of the panel bears down.

The sweat pattern is the quicker clue. Evenly damp is good. A dry patch in the middle of a damp field means there was enough pressure to stop the skin sweating. Once, after a windy day, means nothing. The same patch in the same place for two weeks is a question for the saddle fitter.

• Run a flat hand over the whole saddle area after you dismount, looking for heat and flinching.
• Include the elbow fold. That is where the girth rubs, and where it is hardest to see.
• Scurf under the girth is friction plus moisture, not muck.
• Slacken the girth a hole at the end of the ride, not back on the yard.

What scurf under the girth is telling you

Run a finger under the girth area after work and you sometimes pick up a fine, crumbly deposit. That is dead skin, grease and dust, rolled together by friction. While the skin beneath is smooth, brushing it off and letting it dry is enough. If it comes back with crusting, a bald patch or a lump, stop grooming: that one belongs to the vet.

Rubs happen where you do not look

The classic girth gall does not sit under the middle of the girth. It sits where the skin moves: in the fold behind the elbow, pushed together and stretched out again with every canter stride. Pull both forelegs forward after girthing up and the fold settles flat. And girth in two or three stages, with a few metres of walk between.

Clean kit is half the job

A numnah that has collected salt and hair for three weeks is sandpaper with a soft lining. Wipe the girth, change numnahs rather than turning them over, and take the sweat off leather before it dries. It is the dullest part of skincare and the one with the best return on effort.

You cannot keep a back healthy under kit that is not clean.