why would a horse eat shavings & wood bedding?

Question
QUESTION: My horse had colic and although I never saw her do this people at the barn saw her eating wood bedding and when switched to shaving she eat those.  She has plenty of hay and gets adequate grain.  She is turned out about 6 hrs per day, is worked 4-5 days per week.  I asked the vet why she would do this but he really didn't have an answer (since she gets plenty of hay etc.) Can you give me any insights?  We had to remove all of the bedding in her stall except for a tiny amount.  I've never had a horse do this and am completely stumped why this would happen.  Any information would be very appreciated.  thanks Janet

ANSWER: Hi Janet,

Thank you for your question.  There are a few suggestions why horses consume wood, including wood bedding.  The first suggestion is that horses who lack effective fiber in the diet will eat wood/bedding to increase dietary fiber.  Your horses receives plenty of hay so that is probably not the case for your mare, but I would recommend weighing her daily hay ration to ensure it is truly enough (your horse should consume at least 20lbs of hay per day).  The second suggestion is that consuming bedding is done to imitate natural foraging behavior (or eliminate boredom) in confined horses.  Again, this is probably not the case for your mare as she has ample turnout and plenty of controlled exercise.  The third, and perhaps more questionable suggestion, is that horses will self-medicate with certain natural products in response to discomfort or illness.  Further to that, it has been suggested that certain tree species have anti-inflammatory properties, and so the self-medicate with wood for this effect.  Unfortunately, that suggestion does not give us an indication of where specifically the horse's problem may be.

I am not sure when your mare had her colic in relation to consuming her bedding...but that may help find a solution.  If she consumed her bedding and consequently had an impaction colic, I would suggest feeding a prebiotic (yeast) supplement to help decrease the risk of further impaction by improving cecal fermentation.  The yeast may not keep her from eating her bedding, but it will reduce the associated risks.  If she was having a gas colic and consequently consumed her bedding I would suggest that the bedding consumption was an attempt to remedy cecal acidosis (we see this often in early lactation dairy cattle...who will ignore lovely feed and eat a broom).  In this case you may want to take a closer look at your mare's diet at what might cause the acidosis in the cecum...too much starch in the diet, too much grain fed at once, timing of grain feeding, overall health of the hindgut.  

Unfortunately, this type of behavior can become a weird habit...and even if you are able to eliminate the reason why she eats her bedding, it may not stop her from doing so out of habit.  But your mare may need some sort of bedding so you may want to look at peat moss for her stall.  It is one of my favorites and I have a feeling she will not find it very palatable and give up.

I know this does not absolutely solve the problem for you, but I hope it provides you with some areas to investigate.

Thank you,
Corlena

---------- FOLLOW-UP ----------

QUESTION: Thank you for the information.  It appears that she was eating the bedding during the colic.  She doesn't get too much grain at any feeding (about 2 qts am & pm) and it's not a high starch feed.   So that leaves over health of the hindgut.  What do you suggest for that?  Again, thank you for your insights.  Janet

Answer
Hi Janet,

The two prebiotics that I would recommend are SmartDigest Ultra from SmartPak Equine or Lifeforce Formula from Alltech.  Both are available online directly from those companies and both are very well formulated...if I had to pick one for your particular horse it would be the SmartDigest.

I hope this helps.

Thanks, Corlena