Dental care avoids problems
By Dr. Patrick M. McCue
Colorado State University
Preventive dental maintenance is an important part of raising healthy
horses. Routine dental care prevents painful problems and costly treatments,
and a horse with healthy teeth has reduced risk for colic and weight loss.
Preventive dental maintenance helps horses chew roughage and grain more
thoroughly and, therefore, better digest food. Horses with good dental
care are usually in better body condition than horses whose teeth are ignored.
All horses should undergo occasional dental examinations by a veterinarian,
which include a visual exam and a digital exam to check the incisors, canines,
cheek teeth and soft tissues. Common signs of dental disease include:
- Quidding - repeatedly chewing food and expelling it
- Spilling or spitting grain or inefficient chewing
- Sensitive cheeks or abnormal swelling in the cheeks
- Sensitivity to bits or to drinking cold water
- Shaking or tilting head
- A foul odor from mouth or nostrils
- Excessive salivation
- Exaggerated tongue movements
- Bleeding from the mouth
- Rough hair coat, weight loss or poor performance
A routine oral examination is an important step in preventive dental care
for your horse. A veterinarian should look for these common dental problems:
Dental caps are deciduous teeth - or milk teeth - that the horse should
lose once the permanent tooth emerges from the gum line. Retained dental
caps can prevent permanent teeth from emerging; fragment and lacerate;
infect or swell the gums, tongue and cheeks; and displace the position
of permanent teeth.
Wolf teeth are the first permanent premolars, usually only present in
the upper arcade. It is common to remove these teeth when horses are yearlings
because they can cause difficulty with the bit.
Enamel points are sharp outer edges of upper cheek teeth and inner edges
of lower cheek teeth that develop as a normal part of wear. These sharp
points should be rasped or floated down annually.
Molar hooks are a result of a misaligned upper and lower jaw resembling
an overbite. A hook is formed when the front portion of the first upper
cheek tooth does not wear against a lower tooth or the back portion of
the last lower tooth does not wear against an upper molar. These teeth
continue to grow and form a hook, which should be removed.
Cribbing, or repeatedly biting or chewing on objects such as stall doors,
feed racks or fence rails, is a common behavior when horses need more fiber
or protein, or more attention and exercise. Cribbing causes excessive wear
on the incisors, but may be prevented with a proper diet, toys, companions
or exercise.
Parrot mouth is an extreme overbite. This condition is the most common
congenital oral deformity in horses. Watch for molar hooks and consider
shortening the upper and lower incisors.
Wave mouth is an uneven wave-like pattern on cheek teeth that is more
common on older horses and often occurs in conjunction with parrot mouth
and retained dental caps.
Incisor abnormalities are more common in horses that are stalled and
fed grain or processed diets rather than pasture-fed horses. Watch for
a number of conditions such as retained milk incisors, long incisors and
uneven jaw alignment.
Here are recommended dental care practices based on a horse's age.
- Foals: Check for cleft palate and parrot mouth--or malocclusion--a
misalignment of the upper and lower jaws where the upper jaw overbites
the lower jaw.
- Two- to 3-year-old horses: Remove wolf teeth and examine first permanent
cheek teeth for caps; float points.
- Three-year-old horses: Examine second permanent cheek teeth for caps;
float points.
- Four-year-old horses: Examine third permanent cheek teeth for caps; float
points.
- Five years old and older: Examine and float teeth annually.
Pat McCue, DVM, is an associate professor in equine sciences at CSU with
a special interest in equine reproduction, embryo transfer and reproductive
endocrinology. He received a Ph.D. in comparative pathology at UC-Davis
in 1986. He is a diplomate in the American College of Theriogenologists.
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