Marsha -
I think it is awesome that you recognized that you and Ranger just weren't going to work out together. And it's great to hear that he's going on and doing other things, too.
**********
One of the reasons that I didn't do well as a public, for owners, horse trainer is I've found that over the years I like a specific personality of horse or pony. While I can still work with some of the others, it takes longer for me (no 30 day wonders here!) and that was problematic with the owners. Then, too, I didn't like taking someone's "problems", fixing them and sending the horse home after working with the owner as well and then finding out a few months later that the horse is right back to his/her old bad habits. Often, it's due to the owner not working with the horse (time under saddle, wet saddle blankets, time in harness, mileage) - the horse goes back to what was previously set long before the training I did. Worse, is finding out the horse had reverted from someone else or overhearing someone who didn't know who I was saying nasty things about the training the horse had received BUT after going home the owner hadn't touched the horse!
I have two horse trainer acquaintances that often get horses in every spring for a "tune-up". The owners know that their horse(s) need that "tune-up" after going for several months of no work/schooling. After a 15-30 day work with the trainer, they go home and are fine - all spring, summer & fall. The owner(s) are smart and they get to enjoy their horses - after the "tune-up".
I even have found with the ponies I have, that sometimes temperaments haven't worked. And in some that passes along to the foals, no matter who the sire is.
The one mare that I purchased with a sucking filly at her side - her daughter as a weanling was flighty and hard to deal with. As a yearling, she wasn't any better - I sent her out to be trained and shown and she at least got better about some things and did OK in the ring (she was a late foal and didn't show well as she looked like a baby while others looked mature). When the filly came home, she was no better really and VERY over-reactive the more I worked with her. I hated it and began to really dislike her. In the meantime, with help, we'd gotten her dam started in harness. I never did trust her by herself OR much when was by myself - but as a pair she did OK. She seemed to depend on her "partner". I was OK with that. We'd done a lot of ground work with her, she was fine with having legs/hooves handled AND since she was a digger - she often had either cardboard boxes or empty water/soda bottles tossed in the holes to slow her down and accustom her to stuff around her legs/hooves. Fine with that. Found out later - not fine with that while driving down the road!! On 2 different incidents (with well over 90 solid days of driving) - she had a complete meltdown while in harness and driving when she hit something on the ground that made noise/moved. The 2nd - was a hot wire that had been dropped for the riders/drivers to cross thru a pasture. It wasn't hot and all she had to do was step over it like her partner did. She caught it with her hoof and pulled it a bit (it came right loose but you'd a thought she'd had the heck shocked out of her) - she came completely unglued at that point. Ended up getting her left rear leg over the tongue of the forecart I was driving that day - pretty decently peeling the skin off of it (OUCH). She did get her leg on the correct side, the trace that had come loose while she was pulling her shenanigans was rehooked by another person for me and we both got over the shakes. We had to continue driving as we were miles from the trailers/trail head at that point. She did eventually settle and she wasn't lame - but neither of us really seemed to trust each other again after that. I sure didn't want to hook her by myself - my confidence in my abilities at that point were questioned by me. Again, in the meantime, she produced a surprise colt whom we didn't know who the sire was (not one of ours - would have been pregnant before she was delivered to me) and the colt was no different than the filly I'd purchased with the mare (we didn't know who his sire was but wasn't the same as filly). Didn't end up selling him, euthanized him when a growth in his abdomen was very large and surgical removal wasn't an option... Turned out, it was not cancerous though cause not known and was the size of a basketball - at 18 months of age. When the opportunity arrived, I traded the mare and her 2 yr old filly for another mare related to her but with very different lineage on the dams side. That was a wonderful thing all the way around! The new mare will make a NICE larger riding pony for our granddaughters AND a harness pony as well when I get her going. In the meantime, she is one that just foaled a pretty nice colt last September. I have one of her daughters (purchased at the same time as the other mare/filly) and several of her other foals have made GREAT show ponies and/or have been exported and doing well in the countries they went to. I'm excited both about that AND about the mare I GET ALONG WITH SO WELL...
In other ponies, the flighty personality/attitude doesn't pass to the foal. I currently have two mares that are "wild" and over-reactive. One may never be trained to harness now (you never know tho, maybe?) as I have lots of youngsters coming up that are ready to start harness training - however her two sons (ours - she'd had 4 other foals before we got her and all are doing great w/ their owners as well as show/driving ponies - 2 are full brothers to 1 of ours) by different stallions are completely DIFFERENT than her and one was shown in halter and is already started driving and the other colt is our 2nd JR stallion and will be started in harness. He will also make a superb riding pony (I believe) just like his sire! I'm hoping that he will sire foals like his daddy did as well. The 2nd mare - she supposedly was well trained to drive, was shown and did lead line. I'm wondering if something didn't happen. She gets so tense when she's handled - that she will "bull" right over/thru you. She will eventually relax but she's 21 this year, so... She just foaled the filly on 26 Dec (Blitzen) and I feel like my time might be better spent to play/work with the filly than to bother with the mare. Lead line? I don't think I'll be putting my granddaughters on her at all!!
