The following summer my horse, Chaco, and I, took another trip to the same place in eastern Washington. (See earlier post for the first part of this story). This time I had learned a new way to trim his feet that did not cause him pain. I was looking forward to two weeks of no cribbing.
A few days into our trip he started cribbing. I hadn’t trimmed his feet, so I knew that wasn’t the cause, but two days earlier we had opened the gate to another field. I asked the owner, what was growing in that field. The answer was some clover. I later learned that clover can be high in starch (so can grain), and that causes him to crib.
That same summer the local vet had a record number of founders in horses. For whatever reason with the weather and the plants, horses were foundering and my horse was cribbing.
Clue #5 – Starch causes Chaco to crib.
