Talk:Cribbing (horse)

Old ways
'Great regard ought to be paid to the qualities of a horse, it being universally acknowledged that habit is a second nature.' - The Pocket Farrier or Gentleman's Guide in the Management of Horses Under Various Diseases - By James Ware, Amherst County, Virginia, 1828. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.154.212.165 (talk) 22:07, 11 January 2008 (UTC)

Burnie's car
I think that Burnie's car is a legitimate example of cribbing, taking it off continually seems to be unnecessary. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 216.37.250.10 (talk) 21:07, 10 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Please read WP:Trivia, trivia sections in general are to be discouraged. This issue also is WP:RECENT, and will be non-news in a month or two. Seriously, so a famous person had their car chewed on.  Not a big deal.  Horses have chewed paint on my car too. And what significance is it that some minor celebrity had their car chewed on?  A lot of celebrities have horses, undoubtably some have had their cars chewed on, park a car in a pasture with curious horses and within 5 minutes, there will be teeth marks on the hood.    Montanabw (talk) 22:27, 10 September 2010 (UTC)
 * No. Encyclopedia article on topics like this cover the general phenomenon, not the specific of horse A using object B and horse C using object D. -- Kim van der Linde at venus 22:41, 10 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Just adding a "ditto" to Montana and Kim's comments. This is minor trivia and not necessary for an encyclopedic article. Dana boomer (talk) 01:21, 11 September 2010 (UTC)

A minor Celebrity? DO YOU NOT KNOW WHO MR.BURNS IS? 108.9.107.14 (talk) 15:41, 11 October 2011 (UTC)

Cribbing may not be a stereotypy
The article in several places refers to these behaviours as "Stereotypies". Most definitions of stereotypies regard the behaviour as being "functionless", however, this article discusses cribbing behaviours as having a function in some cases e.g. "...the increase in saliva produced during windsucking could be a mechanism for neutralizing stomach conditions in stable-kept, grain-fed horses." I propose to edit (minor) the article to reduce the emphasis on these behaviours being overly-labelled as stereotypies as they may have a function.__DrChrissy (talk) 17:32, 6 September 2013 (UTC)
 * I about half-agree with you. Research is inconclusive, the saliva thing linked to ulcers is an interesting theory but not verified.  I'm all for adding more to the article to make it fuller in scope, but let's not go too far down the rabbit hole with new stuff.  WP:RS is always best, go sourcing all the way.  Montanabw (talk) 04:00, 7 September 2013 (UTC)
 * All I am thinking of doing is deleting the word stereotypy in the body of the article and replacing it with another suitable word. A brief sentence can be included somewhere, perhaps in the opening paragraph such as "Cribbing is considered by many (references) to be a stereotypy, although in some cases it may have a function (references)"__DrChrissy (talk) 17:14, 7 September 2013 (UTC)
 * I've just been doing a bit of research on cribbing. There are a lot of very unreliable sources out there, however, I found the following - "The digestive process of cribbing horses may differ from horses that do not crib because cribbing horses have lower gastric pH than normal horses, produce less saliva, have slower orocecal transit times and greater incidence of stomach ulcers and particular types of colic than noncribbing horses" on  published in 2008 and then repeated here  in 2012.  Perhaps we could include it as a quote as neither give the original references.__DrChrissy (talk) 17:58, 7 September 2013 (UTC)


 * There are NO "functional" uses for cribbing; it is always undesirable. It has not been disproven as a stereotypy, just that theories for its cause are out there.  (Got a good definition for stereotypy?)  The best source for the basics is The Horse magazine online (http://www.thehorse.com, free login required).  Feel free to root around there for more info.   Montanabw (talk) 00:23, 8 September 2013 (UTC)
 * I agree with you totally that cribbing is undesirable! But, my motivation for suggesting the changes is for accuracy in the use of the term "stereotypy" and to alert readers that there may be different motivating factors in these behaviours under different circumstances.  Cribbing may have a function e.g. lowering gastric pH, and it is likely that this is in some way due to our husbandry (inappropriate feeding).  Therefore, cribbing is an indicator of poor welfare and the horse's attempt to cope with it.  It certainly does not mean everything is OK simply because I want to change the label assigned to the behaviour -  it means the behaviour has a function but husbandry needs changing. Definition: Stereotypies are repetitive, invariant behaviour patterns with no obvious goal or function.  For many years now, the idea of (some) stereotypies having no function has been challenged with the possibility that the animal is attempting to cope with some aspect of its environment, and therefore has a function.  In recent years, this means various other terms are used such as "abnormal, repetitive, invariant behaviour".__DrChrissy (talk) 15:48, 8 September 2013 (UTC)
 * NOnononono.  Cribbing has ZILCH to do with improper feeding!  Pastured horses, even on a drylot, rarely ever crib; it's a thing of horses in stalls. While I agree that the animal is trying to cope with an abnormal environment, that is true of all stereotypies or stable vices in horses (it's why we call them "stable" vices), and I think we are stretching the definition a bit more than we can justify without going into OR land.   Montanabw (talk) 21:19, 8 September 2013 (UTC)
 * I've been looking at the article again. I believe that each use of the word "stereotypies" can be replaced with "abnormal behaviour" or "abnormal oral behaviour".  I would leave the word alone in the lead sentence.  Would this be a suitable compromise for your concern of introducing a euphimism (which is not my intent) and mine for avoiding potentially inaccurate use of a word?__DrChrissy (talk) 16:07, 8 September 2013 (UTC)
 * Not sure. I think that we could insert a small explanation of what we can source about whether cribbing is or is not a stereotypy, though, and if we are overdoing the use of the word we can use "behavior to mix it up a bit...  Montanabw (talk) 21:19, 8 September 2013 (UTC)
 * Ok - let me make the edits and then we can discuss them on here.__DrChrissy (talk) 18:01, 9 September 2013 (UTC)

Updates
I'm concerned that the Lebelt source is a 1998 study. The archer study was 2008. I'm cool with discussing each side of the controversy, though. I'm glad you are interested in this topic and I think the article can be further improved. I tried to meld the two versions and teach the controversy. Onward... Montanabw (talk) 05:55, 5 November 2016 (UTC)


 * I'm finding more sources than I can shake a stick at:  What I'm seeing is a lot of interest in surgical intervention these days, and what I want to say is, "turn them out to pasture for a while or at least let them eat more hay..." (sigh...)  Montanabw (talk) 06:05, 5 November 2016 (UTC)


 * For some reason I missed this thread so apologies for not responding sooner. I think I am of the same mind as you.  I recently read an article which stated that several anti-cribbing methods (surgical and non-surgical) worked to some degree.  However, I did not enter this content as the emphasis IMHO should be in preventing the behaviour starting in the first place, rather than treating it once developed.  This is possibly POV editing on my part, however, the surgical approaches are, in my opinion, COI on the part of veterinarians. DrChrissy (talk) 19:26, 8 November 2016 (UTC)

UK/US?
Should we use UK or US English on this article? I realized we are mixing it. The word "cribbing" is a US word, not sure if a UK term also (or if crib-biting is favo(u)red). I don't have super strong feelings beyond of course, what's more convenient for me (LOL!). If we go by the "creator rule," the creator was User:Eventer, who is a US English user. But figured it best to discuss. No real reason for one over the other beyond creator and consensus -- I don't think there is a local rule on biology articles. Montanabw (talk) 06:25, 6 November 2016 (UTC)
 * As an animal behaviouralist in the UK, I would be equally at ease using/reading both "crib biting" or "cribbing". It would be nice to hear from "horsey" people here in the UK.   I also agree with you about going back to the creation of the article regarding US/UK.  Just a couple of days ago I started this very same discussion on another Talk page to get consensus and a very experienced editor (Epipelagic - but I have not pinged them) said there was no need for consensus.  Sorry! - I still smart at having to write "behavior"!  ;-)  DrChrissy (talk) 17:48, 6 November 2016 (UTC)


 * LOL! And we Yanks worry that you Brits are going to use up letters unnecessarily, particularly the letter "u".  :D  I'm sad that we no longer have some of our best UK horse editors such as Pesky and Richard New Forest (they are around, just not editing WP any more).  If you are OK with US English on this one, based on the "creator rule", we can certainly continue to look to origins on future articles of a similar nature. My understanding of MOS is that step one is if there's a really obvious reason to favo(u)r one version over the other - i.e. London most certainly should be written in UK English.  Step two is to see if consensus can be reached, and where consensus cannot be reached, the default is the creator rule.    Montanabw (talk) 04:09, 7 November 2016 (UTC)
 * Yes, I have read the locality rule before and I follow that especially for articles on animals. For example, if I was editing Racoon I would definitely use US English, regardless of the creator rule.  Happy to go with the creator rule on this one and apologies for my recent edits being UK - it just comes so naturally when typing. DrChrissy (talk) 15:00, 7 November 2016 (UTC)


 * No worries, we all do it sometimes. I'll do the copyedit.  Montanabw (talk) 03:01, 8 November 2016 (UTC)

Delete lignophagia from this article?
To my mind, lignophagia should not be discussed in this article as it could be making a misleading connection. I have seen them lumped together in other works, but I have not seen anything that actually relates the cribbing and wood-chewing. Should we clean wood-chewing from this page? DrChrissy (talk) 19:17, 8 November 2016 (UTC)


 * We need to maybe move the material into the stable vices article -- to the extent it isn't already duplicated there. I also think we may want to create wood chewing as a redirect to... something and maybe make it into an article eventually.  On the other hand, (though this is, of course, OR) I know so many people who refer to wood chewing as "cribbing" and don't understand the difference, I do think there is a need to at least mention it in passing. (some possible sources for that:  and maybe )  Montanabw (talk) 23:14, 8 November 2016 (UTC) Follow up:  I guess we have it already:  Lignophagia.   Montanabw (talk) 23:16, 8 November 2016 (UTC)
 * What about a single sentence in the lead such as "Wood-chewing is a behaviour superficially similar to cribbing, however, it is believed the motivations for these two behaviours are distinctly different." with no further mention of it in this article? DrChrissy (talk) 23:38, 8 November 2016 (UTC)


 * I'd be OK with a sentence in the lead and a very short paragraph in the body explaining the difference with a "main" link. The sources look fine... the big thing is that the two behaviors are frequently confused, and here in the states it is very common for people who have a little knowledge to say that wood-chewing is cribbing.  Montanabw (talk) 09:08, 13 November 2016 (UTC)


 * I know this is a late post, but I want to say that I appreciate what has been done here (since I last disappointedly accessed before 2016). When I was little in Kansas, Dad (born 1931) pointed to chewed stable wood in Grandpa's barn and told me it was cribbing and meant that the "horse was bored". As livestock farmers, we also new about chewing or licking things as a sign of mineral deficiency; so, there was a folk awareness of the distinction. As I came to study developmental delay, cribbing came to mind in discussions of stimming, particularly in the context of otherwise neutraltypical children who are understimulated. Thank you. IveGoneAway (talk) 18:40, 31 March 2020 (UTC)