Horse Teeth And Oral Cavity – An Introduction

Calculus is the accumulation of saliva and food debris that hardens and forms a crust on a tooth. Here it is formed on the canines of some male horses.

Calculus on canines are usually uniform, but in some horses, more feed becomes entrapped in the crusty material.

Canines in some older horses lose their integrity and decay. This is often associated with EOTRH but can also be from trauma.

These teeth of male horses sometimes are placed against something harder, such as a steel stall bar. The result is fracture of the canine.

Canines are found in almost every male horse (stallions and geldings) but are rare in female horses.

Canine teeth of male horses (and occasionally females) can erupt anytime, but most commonly from before birth to 3 years of age.

Canines – Unusual Findings In Horses

Some horses accumulate saliva and feed in the sides of their cheeks that turns to hard calculus on the cheek sides of the first 1 to 3 cheek teeth.

Cheek Teeth Cap Fractures In Horses

Deciduous teeth (“Caps”) of young horses attach themselves to the underlying permanent tooth with tips of tooth. These often break off and remain between the permanent tooth and the gum like a kernel of pop corn stuck between your tooth and gum.

The 12 premolar cheek teeth have precursor deciduous teeth (caps). The 12 molar cheek teeth do not have deciduous teeth.

Cheek teeth when not aligned with the rest of the teeth in the arcade are called displaced.

Cheek teeth have a finite lifespan and when they run out of reserve crown, there is nothing left to hold them in. These are end stage teeth.

On occasion, the cheek teeth of horses need to be extracted, though in my practice, it is extremely rare.

Foreign objects are usually organic (hay and other feed) that get stuck between the cheek teeth when an unusual gap exists.

Cheek teeth fractures are very common and are usually non-events in the horse’s life.

Hooks are the over-eruption of a tooth and are seen when there is no opposition in chewing.

An uneven occlusal surface along the arcade of cheek teeth is commonly called a wave. Some feel that the unevenness needs to be leveled however in my experience, it does not.

The chewing motion is unique to each horse and is affected by oral pain.

Cribbing Rings In Horses

Flabby Cheeks is the description of excessive tissue that lays in front of the first lower cheek teeth of horses. It is one of the three major reasons for bit difficulties and bit rejection as well as one of the primary causes of difficult floating in horses.

Anything can get stuck in the mouth – and when you have no fingers…..

Incisors are the nipper teeth and anything that is not normal is easily seen.

The nipper teeth can be missing from 1) never being there, 2) the cap is gone and the permanent tooth has not erupted yet, 3) trauma, and 4) extraction.

Accumulation of saliva with feed is very common on the canines but not that common on incisors.

Some deciduous incisors hang on longer than they should.

Some deciduous incisors leave remnants between the gum and the permanent incisor.

All incisors have a precursor deciduous tooth that is displaced and ejected by the erupting permanent tooth below it.

Damage is common to the incisors because one of the primary purposes of these teeth is defense.

Incisors usually do not decay except after trauma or if EOTRH is affecting the horse.

Incisor Extractions In Horses

Incisor Fractures In Horses

Incisor Hooks In Horses

When a horse is relaxed, their incisors are kept apart as seen in these photos. On average a horse chews 25,000 times a day. If each chew takes 1 second, then all the teeth are kept out of occlusion 71% of the day.

Supernumerary incisors means there are more incisor teeth than should be there (more than 12 permanent incisors).

The primary wearing factor of the incisors, including length and pattern of wear, is the movement of the tongue over the occlusal surfaces. This is called stropping.

These picture show trauma of an incisor from about 2 years earlier and the removal of the damaged tooth.

Canines are used as weapons and some horses have very big canines.

Oral Cavity Abscess In Horses

On occasion, a growth occurs within the mouth that is benign and just a passing observation. Rarely do they affect the horse unlest they enlarge and cause either pain or restrict the chewing movement.

Whenever trauma occurs inside the mouth of the horse, the reaction from the horse can be anywhere from nothing at all to drooling and an inability to chew.

Overbite In Horses

Parrot mouth only affects the relationship of the incisors to each other where the upper incisors are more forward than the lower incisors and completely miss on occlusion. The cheek teeth are not affected.

Puffy Cheeks In Horses