Latest News

Autumn has just arrived at ‘The Gums’ Armidale with the 30 degrees temperatures just finished and the atmosphere has changed to the cooler nights and fresh mornings. We find ourselves in a fortunate position of having lots of feed going into winter. With a dry start to the summer and a l ... read more

Winter has arrived and the fires are stoked. We are seeing frosts, nice days and cold nights. All animals on the farm are happy and healthy with impressive weight gains. We have decided to keep our large mob of PTIC trade baldy heifers and calve them out, they are due next week. We are also running ... read more

The Autumn conditions we are experiencing this year are a bit different to the last few. Autumn we would expect to have cooler conditions arrive, but the summer heat has continued so far. The resilience we have built into our soils over the past few years, resting our land when we needed it , mulchi ... read more

Spring on our farm is wonderful with the third abundant season in a row. The environmental conditions have allowed the wild life, frogs and birds to thrive. Under the soil is showing promising signs of life, biology worms are thriving in the root zones of plants. The whole eco system is humming abov ... read more

Autumn was a beautiful season and has set us up with feed going into Winter. The cold season has hit with big frosts and very cold winds. The pastures still look great, with clovers still growing and tall grass cover protecting the under story. We have calved the trade heifers that we purchased and ... read more

The Overseer Saddlery is continuing to be the choice for competitors heading to The Royal Easter show. Many products will be represented at the show with clients purchasing new items to attend. This year’s items were: New Overseer Saddle, matching Saddle cloths for Tamworth tentpeggers, Cattle ... read more

Since late last year we have introduced bees into our eco system. The bees have proven to be happy with the conditions here at The Gums. The bees have provided us with some extraordinary flavours from the various pastures and tree blossom around the farm. Our family friend Campbell has set up his be ... read more

It’s been an extraordinary season in the New England, we have seen wonderful pasture growth over the season and the tree health has improved, the birds are rejoicing, in fact the whole eco system is humming. The recovery from the drought is beyond expectations, with all the dams full and over ... read more

Spring has well and truly happened this year due to our efforts after the drought. This winter we carried a growing body of clover, rye grass and many other species right through the season. We have purchased cattle earlier in the year, they aren’t our magnificent cows we bred but they are sho ... read more

At "The Gums" we have experienced a beautiful 12 months on the farm where the seasons were true and the pastures and life on the farm truly got to reach their potential. Our energy over the last months has gone into feeding the soil. We have used three methods to achieve our goals. Firstly we mulche ... read more

Jason & Naomi have been creative and designed three separate Pack Saddle Bags to suit a wider range of client’s needs and requirements. The range starts with the original Pack Saddle Bags to the refurbished Deluxe Pack Saddle Bags to the top of the line Full Leather Pack Saddle Bags. The ... read more

The early spring at "The Gums" is showing very positive results. Although dams are still low the pastures are thick with plant species. We are still low on stock numbers because of low dam water but we have decided the extra rest on plants is a huge seed bank and the whole process will feed the soil ... read more

We have recently completed a new shop fit-out to present our expanded range well, to make packaging our online sales easier, and to ensure your experience when you visit us is the best! ... read more

Jason talks through our approach to Multi Species Cover Cropping in this short video. ... read more

After the devastating drought, we took the chance on the first rain to plant a cover crop. This is the first of six paddocks we planted with a 21 species crop of summer and winter plant varieties which should take us through to spring. We planted this seed mix with BIOCAST as a seed coat and dynamic ... read more

In order to produce beautiful Mohair Noil to pack our Overseer saddles with, first we run the Goats, then we feed the goats, then we apologise to the neighbours when they go walk about and then have to take time off making saddles to shear them. Jason and Dave drew the short straw and spent the mid ... read more

Record low rainfall has now produced our worst drought we have experienced. We aren’t alone, alarmingly the drought is very wide spread. Our decision to sell most of our cows in February this year was worthwhile. We have allowed our farm to rest until the drought breaks. We are still running very ... read more

Finally a wonderful select of Leathers. Jason is constantly searching for the highest quality leathers, sourced from all around the world to produce Overseer Saddles and saddlery products. We have recently purchased a great supply of saddlery leathers and unique pieces to manufacture from. We have t ... read more

This is a video we came across from Thomas Ware & Sons. They are from England and have been tanners of fine leather since 1840. This fascinating video shows you through the traditional tanning process. The Overseer Saddlery has been using this companies Leather in our saddles for 25 years. ... read more

The Australian polocrosse team has regained its title as best in the world at the Adina Polocrosse World cup, defeating South Africa in yesterday’s final and a week of competition in Warwick Qld. The Overseer Saddles were also a part of the winning Australian team, with three Australian players r ... read more

Jason had a visit from his traveling Leather Rep yesterday. After 30 years of purchasing leather Jason still selects each piece to ensure quality control.   We use only top quality leathers sourced from around the world in our saddles and product range. We purchased over 50 sides to ... read more

(Lucy Grills, Photo: Joe McInally Photography) The cream of Australian horses. The best of the best polocrosse riders from around the world; Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, United States of America, the United Kingdom, Ireland, Zambia and Zimbabwe. The Adina Polocrosse World Championships are ... read more

This article first appeared in The Guardian by Gabrielle Chan on the 22nd Oct 2018.This is what Jason has been talking about for the last 10 years. (Photograph: Rohan Thomson for the Guardian) Look after the soil, save the Earth: farming in Australia's unrelenting climate From the red soil of his ... read more

Last week we hosted a Quorum Sensing Masterclass with Dr Christine Jones here at “The Gums”. The day came about through a discussion with three couples Jason & Naomi Simmons, Lock & Heather McPhie and Lee and Kirsty fieldhouse. Together we organised and ran the event. We all had a burning desir ... read more

We hope everybody got some rain and follow up will be important. At "The Gums” we swung into action with our two rigs on the weekend with the sniff of RAIN. Jack and Edward drove the two cruisers for most of weekend, while Jason and Naomi prepared the Vericast Biostimulant from Lee Fieldhouse, at ... read more

Jason's spoke last night at a Southern New England Landcare event, he comes in at 23.30mins. On the evening Southern New England Landcare supported several UNE Ag Extension students to host a free video and film night focussing on Regenerative Agriculture, 6-8pm Monday 20th August at the Wicklow Ho ... read more

Have a peek at this! To keep up the mohair in The Overseer saddles, we have had to adopt 28 goats from our neighbour supplying the saddlery Mohair. They are very quirky, intelligent and agile. We are sure they will fit into our farming landscape.Mohair Noil is an essential part of The Overseer hair- ... read more

We shared a wonderful and successful field day last Thursday here at "The Gums". Here are some snapshots of the enthusiastic Regenerative Agriculture Group that participated. We would like to thank Grant Sims and Joel Williams for sharing their wonderful knowledge. Always remember it’s important t ... read more

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We are hosting this event at The Gums, Jason is one of three speakers. The ‘Road to Regen’ is part of a series of Regenerative Agriculture focussed events SNELandcare have hosted over these past months.  We anticipate this event to be a big step in further understanding the importance of an i ... read more

Thanks to our son Edward for some brilliant photographs this autumn on our farm ”The Gums” in the heart of the beautiful New England Tablelands. Pictured above are two of our Australian stock horses - Tango and Boko. Click the photos below for more details. ... read more

Here we are again on our green manure paddock. Our plan is constantly changing. On our last post we indicated we would wait for the millet seed to mature, but we decided against that because too much energy would then be stored in the seed. So on 11 March we decided to put the flail mower back on th ... read more

It was wonderful to spend the day with Lee Fieldhouse from BIOCAST earlier this month.  Lee shared his knowledge of soils and biological bio-stimulants with us. We are now stocking Lee’s product for distribution on the Tablelands. To help clients understand how a liquid vermicast bio-stimulant is ... read more

Here are our 19 month old PTIC Heifers to calve in late July. All bred at "The Gums" from our commercial herd of Angus cows. These PTIC heifers were joined at 15 months of age with an average weight of 490kgs. Below is a sample of our home grown bulls. They are 19 months at the moment and a select ... read more

Time To Talk About Regenerative Agriculture  Thursday 12 April - Farm Tours with guest Dr Maarten Stapper When | Bus to depart/return 9.00am -1.00pm with extra optionto stay & chat to return by 2.30pm Where | Depart/return to Armidale Visitors Information Centre BOOK HERE http://tix.yt/farm-tou ... read more

The Overseer Saddlery was approached by Tocal Agricultural College to design and construct two saddle stands to teach students how to mount a horse safely and correctly without any hazards. The stands will have the student's saddle mounted to it with the girth done up around the girthing bar. The he ... read more

On our farm “The Gums”, we are renovating a tired paddock next to our yards. This paddock is constantly over-grazed and is used as a sacrifice paddock when handling animals. We first chisel ploughed the paddock and green manured the existing pasture with biological sprays. Four weeks later we pl ... read more

It’s a great week at The Overseer Saddlery. Meet our newest member of The Overseer team – Jack Simmons. The new generation comes on board. Master Saddler Jason Simmons pictured with Jack Simmons and Callan Elliott – representative of Sarina Russo apprenticeships. ... read more

This article first appeared in the Australian Financial review 24th Jan 2018 When Armidale master saddler Jason Simmons was tipped off by fellow craftsmen that one of his most popular saddles, the Overseer Junior Stock Saddle, was being advertised on eBay for $769.99, less than a quarter of his pri ... read more

Congratulations to Vanessa Andrews of Uralla who held the winning ticket. The fully mounted Overseer Junior Stock Saddle is worth $4180 and was raffled at the Guyra Pony Club Zone 13 Jamboree on 12-14 January 2018 at the Guyra showgrounds. Combined sponsorship at The Overseer Saddlery ... read more

Overseer Saddlery would like to thank the Guyra Pony Club for purchasing an Overseer Junior Stock saddle. The Guyra Pony Club has purchased an Overseer Saddle to raffle at their upcoming Zone 13 Jamboree on 12-14 January 2018 at the Guyra showgrounds. Tickets are $10 each and you can contact the cl ... read more

Once your saddle serge is worn out, we can reserge your saddle. A reserge replaces the woollen serge underneath your saddle. Please click the photos below to read about the process. For more information read our saddle care sheet. Happy Riding from The Overseer Team. ... read more

This week Jason has restored a WWI Military saddle for a local client. The restoration included new saddle felts and maintaining its original leathers where possible plus replacing broken straps. The client will keep riding in the saddle, but vows to maintain it for exhibition and historical purpose ... read more

Jason and Naomi have just made a trip to Brisbane and Toowoomba selecting a large range of leathers for the saddlery. As you can see it was a successful trip with the car overflowing. We found a lot of new and interested products, plus a good selection of our standard leathers. Selecting leather a ... read more

This week at the Overseer Saddlery, we have been commissioned by Michael Drapac to build 10 beautiful 4-tier saddle stands on castors for the Australian Stock Saddle Museum in Romsey, Melbourne. Jason and Naomi sealed the computer-shaped Western Red Cedar boards three times. These boards attach to t ... read more

All Overseer saddles are built on a laminated wood and steel tree. These saddle trees provide a solid and well-structured foundation. Here at The Overseer Saddlery we choose wood and steel saddle trees because they have diagonal flexibility, allowing movement with the horse's back but at the same ti ... read more

Jack Simmons, who is about to join The Overseer team, is showing his skills already. Jack is pictured in these photos constructing an Artisan Saddle Stand for his Design and Technology HSC major work. Jack was commissioned to create a rare piece for the Drapac saddle museum in Melbourne. It has just ... read more

Where is your gear from? Is it safe? Michael Drapac, an Australian businessman who is building an Australian Stock Saddle Museum in Romsey, Melbourne is pursuing fraudulent practices in the Saddle making industry. Michael is funding a federal court case to stop the importation of copies of the Aust ... read more

Some interesting facts and figures!  There are lots of animals out there starving with a full bell Many ailments we see in our livestock are simple mineral deficiencies Half the breeding is in the feeding 85% of farm decisions are made on free advice from a salesperson Soil nutrition is ... read more