Miracle Collar to stop cribbing - Has anyone used one?

mitters

mitters

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One of my horses started cribbing over the winter after spending alot of time in. I think it started through boredom/frustration at only being turned out for 1/2 a day. He cribs on his stable door, the fence in the field and any other surface he can get hold of.

I'm sure i have tried everything to try and break the habit but he seems to be getting worse.

He is now out for 12 hours during the day and in at night. He has plenty of grass in the field along with some toys, and when he's in he has as much hay as he'll eat and more toys. He is only 3 so his work is fairly minimal (only just backed), but i do a lot of groundwork to try and keep his mind occupied.

I have tried various pastes and sprays on the fence and door, and tried running electric tape over the top of the fence but nothing seems to stop him.

So i think the last resort is a collar. I have read that the Weaver Miracle Collar is supposed to be a humane way of stopping them cribbing, but i have read many comments on how cruel and torturous all anti-cribbing collars are.

Before i buy one, i'm wondering if anyone has used one of these particular collars and what the results were??

Thanks
 
My boy cribs only cribs occasionally (usually to get attention) but has to wear a collar because of yard rules. I tried the miracle collar because I hate the conventional ones but my horse hated it. It appeared to hurt his forehead and when he had it one he just stood with his head on the floor to relieve the pressure (he is a bit sensitive though!!). I went back to a conventional collar with a leather strap and bought sheepskin bridle pieces to put over the strap to protect his neck. This seems to work and I don't really do it up that tight because just the thought of wearing it seems to prevent the cribbing!
 
Cribbing is not a habit. It is a man made behavioural response to management. This is usually abrupt weaning, cereals in the diet, insufficient forage and confinement. Or more than one of these. The process of cribbing releases endorphins to make the horse more comfortable because the management has usually caused gastric discomfort and ulcers of varying degrees. Using a collar is cruel imo and has actually been proven to make gastric ulceration worse. No collar can be dscribed as humane as it prevents the horse from making itself comfortable!

You have already made good steps by increasing turnout and hay. You should also remove any starch based feeds if he has them and feed only fibre. It would also be wise to get the vet to endoscope the horse to see if there are ulcers present (60% + of leisure horses have them, 90% + of racehorses, 80% + of competition horses) s they can be treated. Using a collar is just treating the symptom, not the cause.
 
agree with teddyt - cribbing is a symptom not the cause and collars only address the symptom and it's better to look at and treat the cause.
 
I'm pretty sure the cause of the cribbing was boredom over the winter. I have tried to get rid of the cause by giving him toys, ad-lib hay, all day turnout, more handling/groundwork etc but it has continued to get worse. He seems to do it when theres horses moving about on the yard and things going on, once the yard is quite he seems to be fine, so it may also be a stress related issue. He also does a lot of door kicking!

I don't think he would have ulcers as he has only been fed Hi-Fi and High Fibre Nuts, but i may give the vet a call to see what they think.

Sounds like the collars are not a good idea then....?
 
But if he was in for 18 hours plus a day then he may have had long periods without hay, if he finished it. The stomach continually produces acid so in the absence of food it digests the stomach lining instead. Bearing in mind that the stomach is emptied in an hour to an hour and a half, if a horse finishes its hay at even 2 am and isnt seen until 7, thats 5 hours!

So its not necessarily boredom but lack of fibre going thorugh the gut. it can happen if there is insufficient grazing in winter and no hay in the field too. The horse cant physically eat enough for the acid to work on.

Stress will make it worse, yes. And if its got worse then i would definately speak to a decent equine vet.

Sounds like the collars are not a good idea then....?
Click to expand...

Yep. Dont waste your money! :)
 
As the others have said it is a stress response.

My horse came with a miracle collar - previous yards were a comptetion home and restricted turnout. I used it for about 3 nights before I gave up as it didn't seem to make any difference. What did make a diffference was ad lib hay, a fibre diet, treating for ulcers/EGUS and yo turnout - here they are stabled over night for the minimum time so Dec - Feb depending on the weather. He has just spent his second winter here and wasn't seen to crib or windsuck at all.

Can you turn him out 24/7?
 
He does get ad-lib hay and he always has hay left in the mornings. During the winter he was getting ad-lib hay in the field during the morning, then when he came in was getting a bucket of hi-fi and more hay. Basically he was getting hay 24 hours a day! He now has plenty of grass all day, and ad-lib hay at night (still some left in the mornings). I have only ever fed him Hi-Fi and high fibre nuts as advised by a nutritionist, who also knows the horse well.

Turning him out 24 hours a day would not be possible as it would mean he would be on his own at night as my other horse has to come in as he gets too fat, plus it means we would run out of grass (made this mistake last summer). And i don't think it would solve the problem as he cribs in the field as much as in the stable.

I'm pretty sure the cause was boredom during the winter when being stable for 16-18 hours a day. The cause has now been eliminated so its now just a bad habit that he has got into. I bit like humans chewing their nails?!?

I will however give my vet a call and see what she suggests, and maybe try Feedmark Settelex. I will leave the collar to a last resort when i know there is definately no cause!
 
The problem is that once a horse has started to crib-bite the neurological changes never reverse so although you've now changed his management he will continue to do it. When a horse is stressed over a period of time it activates the hypothalamic pituitary axis, and essentially opiods are released from the amygdala onto the ventral tegmental rea. This results in dopamine binding to D1 receptors on the nucleus accumbens, which gives a pleasurable sensation overriding the stress. Horses that crib bite have learnt to activate this pathway to cope with stress (same as a human dentainee rocking backwards and forwards) and actually have greater number of D1 receptors on nucleus accumbens and less D2 receptors (off stwitches) on the ventral tegmental area.

Attempting to stop crib biting by physical methods is removing the horse's ability to cope and will cause a great deal of stress. Instead think about increasing co-species contact (half height partitions so he can touch other horses) and increasing visual horizons as much as possible. Feed a fibre based diet with ad lib forage right up to the time of exercise. Many horses begin crib biting to relieve the pain of stomach ulcers and then continue after the ulcers have healed due to their altered neurological circuitry.

If you're interested in finding out more I'd suggest reading anything by Hemmings, McBride, Parker or Cooper.
 
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