young horse starting to nibble on wooden posts, would this be considered crab biting?

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hi, he is only a yearling and has started nibbling wooden posts nothing major, but noticed a few. so have electric fence on now around all posts so he wont be at it, have got him a lick and he loves it. prob just bordom even though he has 20 acres to wonder around. would you be worried, is it crib bitting or what would you think if he was yours. i think just bordom but i am worried about it, as he is for sale, but this is the 1st he has done it.

also it was wooden posts where some neighbours feed them apples ect, so it could just have been that. what do you all think. thanks

sorry yes crib biting, dont mind my spelling.
 
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sorry, do you mean crib biting? If he's just nibbling on the wood then no. Crib biting is if they take hold of the wood and gulp air into their stomach. Often a sign of hunger. It doesn't sound like he is doing this though. Chewing wood can be for a variety of reasons, sometimes because they are lacking it vits and mins. However, you say he is in a huge paddock so i doubt it that. More likely to be due to bordeom and general baby naughtness!
 
My 3yo was doing this earlier, cue major panic from me as my sisters horse crib bites and I was worried she'd started copying her! However it was probably because I was a bit late bringing her in from the field, so I'm hoping it was just because she was bored- have only seen her doing it once, but will be keeping a close eye on it from now on.
 
There is alot of scientific research out there to say that horses do not copy behaviours from one another (crib biting, weaving etc). Chances are if more than one horse is performing one of these behaviours on the same yard then they are both in an unsuitable management routine.

OP your youngster was probably just bored / being a bit of a baby.
 
just wondering if crib biting is grabing a post and sucking air. what is wind sucking is that not wind sucking. sorry just always thought chewing and biting wood was crib biting.

i am over the moon my boy is just bored, but what is the difference in wind sucking and crib biting.

thanks for helping
 
Windsucking is when you see the horse gulping down air and cribbing is when they grab something to hang onto and then suck down the air. There is no definative solution to stop it or why horses do it, just a lot of different opinions!

However if your baby horse has started to nibble wooden posts, then I would look at how he is fed because he could actually just be hungry or lacking some minerals.
 
Nibbling wood isn't crib biting, it's just nibbling wood :p He could be nibbling it for a number of reasons, for example curiousity (youngsters test things with their mouths), hunger, boredom, or a lack of a certain vitamin/mineral. Perhaps get him a mineral lick? :)

If it were crib biting, he would hold onto the wood, arch his neck, and gulp in air (crib biters make quite a distinctive noise). Crib biting is basically wind sucking, but holding onto something with their teeth.
 
Young horses just love soft wood to chew. At the moment my ponies are stripping the bark off some fallen tree branchs. Horse do not just eat grass ,they will eat berries,leaves, nettles,thistles, like us anything tasty.
If a horse persistantly chews a stable its usually a sign its bored and needs either more turn out or something more to eat or something that takes longer to eat.
Also horses will chew or run their teeth along a stable door when waiting to be fed or turned out. Its not true cribbing, just telling you to hurry up. A bit like someone drumming their nails with impatience.
A true cribber, its a sound once heard never forgotten and will go on and on, and it can be done without the gulping air.
Horses also will gulp air when anxious, sometimes my mare does this when the vet comes but this is not windsucking as it only happens once. Windsuckers will do it for hours to the exclusion of eating and thats why its so bad for them.
My horses where stabled on a yard where we had a couple that cribbed and wind sucked, they did it before they came and no other animal started doing it on the yard by watching them.
 
Youngsters DO tend to nibble fence posts (some of mine have chewed right through the ruddy things!) We have to remember that horses evolved as browsers and nibblers and that they need roughage - particularly when their teeth are coming through! We tend to feed them processed feeds that are very consistent, keep our fields clean and tidy and protect the trees in them!! So they can't find fallen branches etc to nibble on - a fence post is just a substitute for what they'd find on the ground (or above their heads) wandering round in the wild.

A solution - and one I'm going to test this winter - is to provide a few branches from 'safe' trees scattered in the fields for them to nibble on. Hopefully they'll pick those rather than the fence posts!
 
Don't worry, you'd know if it was cribbing. All my babies like to chew and I used to be paranoid as my broodmare cribs for Scotland. The research suggests its not a learned behaviour though. I've put electric wire above my post and rail and nearly eaten away!
 
A solution - and one I'm going to test this winter - is to provide a few branches from 'safe' trees scattered in the fields for them to nibble on. Hopefully they'll pick those rather than the fence posts!

What a good idea. I have a willow that needs some branches taking off and seeing as they love chewing on it I will just leave it in the field. When we chopped the hawthorn down we just left it in the field and they had a great time eating it
 
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