Parrot mouth can be managed to minimize the impact if it is treated early enough. Tansy will now need dental services every six months.
The importance of regular equine dentistry by a
qualified veterinarian or equine dentist
cannot be over emphasized.
In very simple terms, there is no point feeding your horse if he has no teeth to eat it with. Regular dentistry will save you money in the long run.
A horse’s teeth keep growing each year. Actually it’s not so much that they keep growing as they keep ‘erupting’. This continues through the horse’s life, increasing in length by approximately 1/8 inch each year. A very old horse might start to lose teeth as the roots become shallow.
Horse need to have their teeth ground, or ‘floated’, by a suitable professional each year. We cannot stress enough how important it is that this is done by a professional. A ‘backyard rub’ with a metal file is inappropriate and potentially dangerous and could do terrible injury to your horse or yourself. (Would you go to someone who had no dental training but shoved a huge metal rasp in your mouth and ground away at your teeth?) The only way to achieve an affective dental service is with lights to see inside the horse’s mouth and specialised tools to reach every nook and cranny.
This treatment is to ensure that there is an appropriate grinding surface between the lower and upper jaws. Often, teeth will not wear evenly, and food begins to get caught or is swallowed with insufficient grinding (which can result in blockages in the gut and colic). Sharp hooks and edges can lacerate their cheeks and jaw, causing pain and infections, and can interfere with the bit in the horse’s mouth and cause him pain when riding. (Many ‘bad vices’ displayed by horses, such as head tossing, running through the bit and even rearing can be attributed to painful mouth issues that are made worse by the presence of the bit and when you pull on the reins.)
Sometimes a horse can accidentally crack or break teeth. Just like us, this can lead to abscesses and infections and loose teeth. And because you cannot open your horse’s mouth easily to look inside, you might not know until the situation becomes quite serious. The annual dental service can find and correct these problems before they get too big.
Occasionally, a horse may be born with a congenital mouth deformity, such as an overbite or ‘parrot mouth’. This was the case for rescue horse, Tansy. The overbite means that the first premolar (see picture) doesn’t have an opposing tooth below it to grind on and so grows too long. As Tansy’s mouth had been untreated for so many years, this had resulted in long talons growing down into her mouth and making it very difficult for her to grind her food properly and eat. Lack of condition and pain were the result as well as an increased risk of colic due to her food not being chewed enough.
The overbite also means that the front teeth (incisors) do not have opposing teeth at the bottom and grow down. Tansy’s were very long, beginning to grow into her lower lips. In the picture, you can see that she’s actually lost several teeth (she should have six) and
the one on the right has actually died.
All these dental issues means it’s much harder for Tansy to get the most out of every mouthful and, consequently, she is lighter than our other horses and always will be.
One of the most important things you can do for your horse each year is to have your vet or professional dentist complete a yearly dental service. Your horse will thank you!
