🧠 Vet Insight 2025: Cribbing in Horses—What It Is, Why It Happens, and What You Can Do 🐎🌾

Cribbing, also known as crib-biting or wind-sucking, is a puzzling and often frustrating behavior seen in some domestic horses. Once thought to be a “vice” or “unsoundness,” modern veterinary behaviorists now recognize it as a stereotypy—a compulsive, repetitive action horses perform to self-soothe. In this 2025 guide, Dr Duncan Houston explores what cribbing is, why it starts, and how to manage it compassionately and effectively. 🧠🐴

🔍 What Is Cribbing?

Cribbing involves a horse grasping a solid horizontal surface—like a fence rail or feed bucket—with their upper incisors, pulling back, arching their neck, and sucking in air. This produces a distinct grunting or burping noise. 🪵💨

Some horses lick or mouth the object first. Others crib without even using a fixed object. Cribbing is often confused with wind-sucking, but the latter doesn’t require an object to grasp. ✅

📸 Cribbing Step-by-Step:

1. The horse places its incisors on a solid edge
2. It arches its neck and pulls back, sucking in air
3. The horse releases and may repeat the action several times in succession

This behavior becomes habitual and ritualized, often occurring without any apparent trigger. It's not done for food or reward—it’s simply self-reinforcing. 🔄

🧬 Why Do Horses Crib?

Cribbing hasn’t been seen in wild horses. It is considered a response to stress, confinement, or frustration. Cribbing may begin when a horse is:

• 🚫 Weaned abruptly
• 🏠 Stalled for long periods without turnout
• 🥕 Fed a low-fiber, high-concentrate diet
• 🐴 Lacking social interaction with other horses

Cribbing has a strong association with management practices rather than being copied behavior. Horses managed in isolation and fed high-grain diets are much more likely to crib. 🧠

Breed and Sex Risk Factors:

• 🏇 Most common in Thoroughbreds and Warmbloods
• 🎠 Frequently seen in dressage and eventing horses
• 🐎 More common in stallions and geldings than mares

🩺 Is Cribbing Bad for Horses?

Cribbing isn’t dangerous in itself, but it can lead to complications over time:

• 🦷 Excessive wear of the incisors
• 💢 Changes in neck muscles and jaw structures
• 🧠 Potential association with colic (due to stress or air swallowing)
• 🏚️ Damage to fences, stalls, and equipment

However, the bigger concern is not the cribbing—it’s why the horse is doing it. It’s usually a sign that the horse’s environment isn’t meeting its emotional or physical needs. 🔎

🛑 Should You Stop Cribbing?

Many people try to stop cribbing using:

• 🔗 Collars or cribbing straps
• 🚫 Unpleasant taste deterrents
• ⚡ Electrified fences
• 🔪 Surgery (involving nerves and muscles in the neck)

But these strategies only address the symptom, not the cause. Studies show that when cribbing is physically prevented:

• 📈 Horses become more stressed
• 💥 Cribbing intensifies once the restriction is removed

Cribbing may be as essential to some horses as eating. Blocking it without improving the horse’s quality of life can backfire. 🧠

✅ How to Manage and Reduce Cribbing

1. 🌿 Improve Diet

• 🥕 Provide constant access to forage (hay or pasture)
• 📉 Reduce or eliminate grain and high-starch feeds
• 🧠 Consider gastric health—treat for ulcers if indicated

2. 🏞️ Increase Turnout and Social Contact

• 🐴 Let the horse live with other horses if possible
• 🚶 Use paddocks or pasture over stalls whenever feasible
• 🧘 Minimize group disruptions (avoid frequent herd changes)

3. 🧠 Create Enrichment

• 🎾 Provide toys or hanging licks
• 🌾 Use slow-feeder hay nets in multiple areas
• 🔁 Keep routines consistent and stress levels low

🍼 Prevention Tips

To help prevent cribbing from developing in young horses:

• 🍼 Use gradual, low-stress weaning
• 🍃 Maximize pasture access early in life
• 🌿 Feed forage-based diets, not grain-heavy rations

Once cribbing starts, early intervention with lifestyle changes may reduce or reverse the behavior—especially if addressed within the first few weeks. ✅

📲 Ask A Vet: Support for Behavior and Management

If your horse is a chronic cribber or showing signs of developing stereotypies, the Ask A Vet app can help. Consult directly with Dr Duncan Houston for behavior evaluations, nutritional plans, and barn management ideas. 📱🐴

• 📸 Submit photos and videos of your horse’s setup and behavior
• 📋 Review feeding routines and stall habits
• 🧠 Get science-backed guidance and realistic solutions

Download the Ask A Vet app today and work with professionals who understand the emotional and physical needs of horses. 💬

🏁 Final Thoughts: Cribbing Isn’t a Vice—It’s a Signal

Horses don’t crib to annoy us—they do it because something in their life is out of balance. Cribbing is a window into your horse’s stress and unmet needs. 🧠

Instead of blocking the behavior, look deeper:

• 🌾 Are they getting enough forage?
• 🏇 Are they bored, stalled, or isolated?
• 🩺 Do they need ulcer treatment?

🐾 For tailored advice, visit AskAVet.com or download the Ask A Vet app to connect with Dr Duncan Houston. Together, we can manage cribbing with compassion, not confinement. 🐎💙