Wedging a Cribber.
Some dealers temporarily make a horse desist from cribbing by driving hard wood wedges between his front incisor teeth. Another old plan is to saw between the teeth. The soreness makes it painful for the horse to practise the habit of cribbing. Such a horse may be returned to the commission man, no matter how much time has elapsed since the purchase. The trick is difficult to discover unless the horse has cribbed long enough to render the appearance of the teeth suspicious. In the confirmed cribber the teeth are worn off or levelled and usually have lost the marks.
Another way of stopping a horse from cribbing is to blindfold the animal, place a block of wood on the incisor teeth and strike it with a mallet. By this cruel means the parts are made so sore that the horse temporarily stops catching hold of the manger to crib and suck wind.
The buyer should always, when possible, see the horse in the stall prior to the show out. If he remembers this and moves quick enough he may see the horse wearing a strap buckled around his neck just back of the ears. Such a horse is a cribber and wind-sucker and the strap is put on to prevent the latter vice.