Cribbing & Colic

Many people recognize that some horses have vices and all horse owners tend to live with them as best we can. Many people do not realize the seriousness of cribbing and how detrimental it can be to a horse's health. In Equine Health and Boarding Horses you will find an article called "Combatting Cribbing". Many boarded horses are cribbers and I thought it appropriate to include the article in this category as well. Now, I am going to tell you my horror story with cribbing.About three years ago I acquired a 4 year old Appendix Quarter Horse Gelding. He was easily pushing 17 hands and was named appropriately, "Big John." He was a beautiful bay and I had a lot of plans for him. Unfortunately, I only had him about a year before I lost him.Big John was an extreme cribber. The previous owner failed to alert me of this until after I had the horse and the owner of the boarding barn called to tell me he was cribbing on a t-post in the pasture. Then she gave me the cribbing collar that she had bought for him before. I didn't think much of it at the time, but I didn't really know the extent of it yet either. It seemed that the cribbing collar was helpful and he didn't really do it all that much.Then, I moved to a really nice boarding barn and he had a nice size stall and a good size run of his own. Then he became a cribbing monster. As soon as his last piece of grain was gone he turned to the nearest pole on the stall and started sucking air. So, we upgraded the cribbing collar. We got a Miracle Collar and it seemed to work pretty well.Months went by and all was good. The summer came and went and then in January my husband and I and some friends went to Las Vegas for a little vacation. The boarding barn manager took care of Big John and all was fine while we were gone. About three weeks later though that was it.I was on my way to feed when I got the phone call that he was down in his stall. When I pulled up to the barn they had him up and walking but he was shaking. He had prolapsed, which means his rectum was coming out of his rear. He was in extreme pain. We called every vet in town and nobody would come out!!! Only one would answer the phone, but he couldn't leave. There was no way this horse could ride in a trailer, he could barely stand up on his own. So, we were instructed to give him Banamine, and walk, walk, walk. I walked that horse all day. I did my best to keep him up. He had rolled and thrashed so viciously in the early morning that he had given himself a black eye and had rubbed hair of his body. I talked to the vet and he said it looked like he would be okay since the prolapse went in on its own, but he wasn't sure if were out of the forest yet. I sat with him until I had to go to work and then I switched shifts with my barn manager. I hadn't got 15 minutes away when she called and said he was gone. I attribute this horrible case of colic to cribbing. He had sucked himself so full of air that when he rolled he twisted a gut and that was it. So that, is my horror story with cribbing and why it is a vice that cannot be ignored.

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