Windsucking - Discuss/General Advice

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patchypony

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So I have a 13yr gelding, has windsucked since I have known him and usually only does it immediately after eating. He went through a period of bad condition and is just starting to put it back on again. He has 3 x hard feeds a day, plenty of good quality haylage throughout the day and turnout at night.

Is this just his 'thing' or is it worth investigating? I have seen a load of posts to do with ulcers/stomach discomfort but I know that every horse is different...
 
patchypony said:
Star catcher William - interesting! Have you heard good things?
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I've seen lots of posts on here about them but still don't know if they actually work. My 8 year old exracer is a wind sucker, I'm not convinced it's caused by ulcers as he has no other symptoms. I suppose he could have very low grade ones or maybe general digestive discomfort which makes him wind suck. Or it could just be a habit!
 
I firmly believe it can be a habit - just like nail biting in humans.

A TB I once knew wind sucked like crazy - on anything! He was scoped several times for ulcers and nothing showed up but the windsucking actually seemed to relax him.

His owner eventually gave up and just let him get on with it, it upset him more trying to stop him.
 
Windsucking is a stereotypic behaviour, so can persist long after the cause.
For example, it has been shown that weaning stress can cause stereotypic behaviour so a horse may have begun then and (as madlady says) it becomes a habit. There is some interesting research by SEbastian McBride into the brain pathways involved and whether it becomes more like an addiction.
Of course, other stressors such as ulcers are also believed to trigger windsucking behaviour but it doesn't mean that any one horse has ulcers at the time it is seen windsucking or even that ulcers were the cause originally or the only cause. So I wouldn't assume ulcers if there are no other signs of ulcers being present.
Madlady is also right in that trying to stop a horse from showing stereotypic behaviour can upset the horse - it is believed to be a coping mechanism and they have lower stress parameters if allowed to do it than if prevented from doing it. (The prevention is usually to reduce stress in the humans seeing it rather than for the horse's welfare!!).
 
Used to work in a trekking yard where we had a gelding that would windsuck off the leadrope whilst being led. He was so imaginative, could windsuck off anything!! Attempts to get him to stop really stressed him out. He became VERY frustrated. Much kinder to let him off as it wasn't affecting him really.
 
Knockadoon said:
Used to work in a trekking yard where we had a gelding that would windsuck off the leadrope whilst being led. He was so imaginative, could windsuck off anything!! Attempts to get him to stop really stressed him out. He became VERY frustrated. Much kinder to let him off as it wasn't affecting him really.
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Sounds more like cribbing where they grab somethig and suck in air, windsuckers don't usuallly grab anything when they suck in air :)
 
I'm going to look at a horse to buy (my first) and it windsucks. Would you avoid a horse that does this? Apparently she has always done this, with no apparent health consequences ... it's hard to figure out if it's something to actually worry about.
 
wookiewookie said:
I'm going to look at a horse to buy (my first) and it windsucks. Would you avoid a horse that does this? Apparently she has always done this, with no apparent health consequences ... it's hard to figure out if it's something to actually worry about.
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I wouldn't worry me too much if the horse was spot on with everything else I was looking for and the price was right. But bear in mind that some yards won't take cribbers/windsuckers and cribbing can cause a lot of damage.
 
Avoid. Most yards won't take on one as they is still a strong line of thinking that the behaviour can be copied (I don't hold with that). More importantly, wind sucking can be caused by a huge variety of problems and it is virtually impossible to pinpoint what is wrong. It could anything from a lack of forage, to ulcers, stress etc. I have seen 2 cribbers end up with surgical colic and had one myself, so researched this. I reduced the behaviour a lot but never got rid of it completely.
 
wkiwi said:
Windsucking is a stereotypic behaviour, so can persist long after the cause.
For example, it has been shown that weaning stress can cause stereotypic behaviour so a horse may have begun then and (as madlady says) it becomes a habit. There is some interesting research by SEbastian McBride into the brain pathways involved and whether it becomes more like an addiction.
Of course, other stressors such as ulcers are also believed to trigger windsucking behaviour but it doesn't mean that any one horse has ulcers at the time it is seen windsucking or even that ulcers were the cause originally or the only cause. So I wouldn't assume ulcers if there are no other signs of ulcers being present.
Madlady is also right in that trying to stop a horse from showing stereotypic behaviour can upset the horse - it is believed to be a coping mechanism and they have lower stress parameters if allowed to do it than if prevented from doing it. (The prevention is usually to reduce stress in the humans seeing it rather than for the horse's welfare!!).
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Great post!
 
My horse is 10 and cribs, I bought him at 6 and had him scoped at 8, he had a lot of grade 1 and 2 ulcers. I only had a collar on him for less than a year as it rubbed and seemed to stress him out, he gets a cribbing post in his field and uses that, the rest of the fencing has electric tape running over it.

I would buy a cribber/windsucker again but I would buy at reduced price do you the problem, I would also ask the owner to get the horse scoped for ulcers and if clear you would buy or if has them the existing owner to treat. They should have insurance so no reason not to.

With cribbers its always worth looking at feed, as natural as you can without lots of starches and sugars and ad lib hay. I feed thunderbrooks chaff, micronized linseed, aviform pro complete balancer and organic grass nuts and he's happy, he really struggles if goes without hay in the winter. Mine is however very sensitive. I say this but he is a star, he's excellent to train, fab jumper that doesn't spook at fillers etc, loves his XC, very rare he looks or dives out at something, usually rider error.
 
Opening this up again as I made a little discovery which is quite interesting! I received an email last week from Equifeast advertising a supplement for wind sucking. I clicked through to their website as I have used their supplements in the past. Their wind sucking one is called "Nutrisoothe" and when I clicked on the ingredients it is basically bicarbonate of soda - albeit very expensive!! But this got me thinking! I have some of this at home so last night I added a teaspoon to champion windsucker's (well, he's actually a cribber who is slowly but surely dismantling his stable and field) feed. He still cribbed immediately after finishing his food. But this morning I gave him some again in his breakfast and.... no cribbing! I was quite astounded. Obviously I'm not saying he's cured and to be honest he will probably always crib because it's an ingrained habit which I think he enjoys, but I will continue to use this and monitor the results. You can buy food grade bicarb of soda very cheaply off eBay by the way. No need to resort to spending £31.75 for 4kg from Equifeast! :-)
 
StarcatcherWilliam said:
*Following!

I'd also love to know if Colligone or Settlex really work for windsuckers?
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I have tried both of those on my wind sucker and they made no difference, but i've never heard about using bicarbonate of soda, please give an update on if he has still given up the cribbing/windsucking.
 
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I tried settlex some years ago and it made a bit of difference but didn't stop it....mine used to always crib after eating a feed and it then progressed to cribbing on the fencer in the field at any time.....I think ,with my mare, it is linked to cushings...since she has been treated with prascend the cribbing has stopped and one of the signs that her levels have increased are that she starts to crib again, once her prascend has been increased(on vets instruction) she stops cribbing. it may just be my mare but worth thinking about
 
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