About stereotypies
"Stable vice." Two words that have probably caused quite a lot of harm to horses.
Cribbing, weaving, and box-walking are not character flaws or bad habits that should punished, they are behavioural responses to a management environment that conflicts with what horses are built to do: forage continuously, move freely, maintain social contact. The research on this is consistent and has been for years.
What the evidence also shows, and what I find most important from a welfare standpoint, is that physically suppressing these behaviours without addressing their cause doesn't help.
In some cases, it actively makes things worse.
Crib-straps raise cortisol. Anti-weave bars raise cortisol. The behaviour was doing something, serving a purpose.
I wrote a piece on this, drawing from the neurological and behavioural literature, and thought I’d share it here.
https://open.substack.com/pub/pathtobloom/p/cribbing-weaving-box-walking-what?r=7n2bxe&utm_campaign=post-expanded-share&utm_medium=web
(This is not a self promotion post, I'm not selling anything.)