Eating manure. Regarded as aberrant or stereotypic behavior it may simply be a response to intermittent feeding in stabled horses driven by time between meals, gut fill, pain from stomach ulcers etc. Insufficient dietary fibre is a potential cause as boosting fibre intake will often reduce coprophagy along with wood chewing and bed eating. High starch diets may also be at fault as replacement of some starch with fat as an energy source may reduce coprophagy. In essence it is a response to modern feeding and management practices and is virtually unknown in wild horses at pasture. Neonate foals will sometimes consume faeces of the dam, but this is likely related to simple inquisitive behavior or possibly populating their gut with a normal microbiome.
