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The Horse |
Health Features - Dental Care |
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Like you, your horse will have two sets of teeth during its lifetime, a baby set which starts to shed at around 2 1/2 years of age and a permanent set. The permanent teeth however, will continue to grow all of the horse's life until there is no more 'crown' left or produced.
A horse has between 36 & 42 teeth. The incisors are used to select and tear off blades of grass, stems of hay or kernels of grain. There
are 12 incisors. The molars grind the food and prepare it for digestion. There
are 24 molars, 12 of which start as baby teeth, while the remaining 12
only appear as permanent teeth. Male horses (and some females) have
4 canine teeth located between the incisors and molars. These
are sometimes called bridle teeth and usually come through when the
horse is 5. Horses of either sex can have
2 to 4 vestigal teeth known as wolf teeth, which usually appear in front of the
first molars. Blind wolf teeth are those that have not appeared through the gums yet. Nature designed the horse with replenishing teeth in order to cope with lifelong grazing of pasture, however domestication and high performance diets mean that the modern horse has a diet which consists of grains and hay which require a more up-and-down action than grazing and can lead to the development of sharp points. Moreover selective breeding has ignored good teeth as a requirement for the modern horse and at the same time modern feeding methods have allowed those horses with malformed mouths or poor teeth to survive when they would not have in the wild due to malnutrition.
How important is dental health for Horses? Teeth are particularly important for the horse, which cannot rely on multiple stomachs for digestion of tough plant material.
With poorly performing teeth, the horse's digestive system receives material with longer fibres which are harder for the bacteria in the gut to breakdown.
This can lead to weight loss or worse, impaction colic. Any horse which suffers from either or both of these problems should immediately have it's teeth checked. Bad teeth rank highly as reasons for poor performance, bad behaviour, such as rearing and strange habits, such as head shaking.
Regular dental care is essential if you want your horse to be in the best health and at his most cooperative.
Your horse should be seeing a trained equine dentist at least yearly and it is highly recommended on a 6 monthly basis. Foals should first have their teeth checked in the first few weeks of life, both to accustom the foal to having its mouth handled and to identify any congenital problems such as overbite.
Wolf teeth (blind or erupted) are best removed at one. This allows a full recovery before any work with a bit is required. Horses under 5 years old should have bi-annual dental checkups, racehorses or young sport horses may require more frequent attention as do those with problems identified during the foal's first check.
Between 2 and 5 years of age your horse will be losing its baby teeth,
or caps as they are sometimes known, and many stable fed horses have
problems losing these teeth. They can be easily pulled by a dentist
during a routine check. You should also have your horse's teeth checked if it suffers any of the following symptoms.
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Sharp points and hooks on the first and last cheek teeth.
Hooks prevent the full length of the cheek teeth from grinding against one another.
Sharp points can also cause pain and interfere with the proper action of the bit leading to behavioural problems or the inability to ride with any contact.
However all can be easily eliminated by having your horse's teeth floated on a regular basis. Overcrowded teeth Just like humans this may be inherited or caused by a rapid growth phase.
A dentist would need to reshape or remove teeth in order to correct this and provide the remaining teeth to align correctly. (No braces for horses yet) Wavy Mouth
The molars form 'waves' when viewed from the side in this condition.
Instead of the upper and lower molars meeting on a level chewing surface,
there are high and low molars which mean that the horse can only chew in a
very modified way. Can occur in older horses and those with
overbites and is corrected by floating the teeth. Step Mouth Similar to Wavy Mouth but less common.
In this case when the molars are viewed from the side the rear molars are vary high and the front molars low, causing a 'step' effect. Periodontal Disease (Gum Disease) Avoid excessively coarse feeds which could get stuck between teeth and cause gum infections.
Regular dental care will head off possible problems and infections would be treated by your vet with antiseptic and anti-biotic treatments.
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