No Horse on a Handshake

In researching intelligent horse ownership the other day, I ran across an excellent and relevant article called "Horse on a Handshake" in Horse and Rider magazine, June 2000 issue [1]. It covered major pros and cons of leasing a horse for people in the decision-making process. The author brought to bear the legal issues such as budgeting, flexibility, the type of horse, veterinarian fees, liability, and care that should be fully arranged between the prospective lessee and leeser for a smooth experience.

Another rider's parent passed along an 8-question true-false quiz to test and rate a reader's knowledge of intelligent horse ownership [2]. As we go through the questions, I will answer them with as much knowledge as I can glean from the horsemanship magazines that were graciously donated to me.

Question 1: Do horses need a lot of care. True or False

Answer: True

If you want your horse to respond to the bit properly in Dressage practice, it’s very important to have a healthy set of teeth. Horses do get cavities and can be born with crooked teeth. Teeth also deteriorate as a horse gets old. Regular dental visits, adjustments, and filing are also needed to digest and extract all of the vitamins from food for a healthy horse inside and out. Symptoms like swollen gums, drool, half-eaten food, mouth or nostril odor, and tooth grinding are clues of dental problems. Also, use common sense if a horse has any other signs or appears uncomfortable chewing food.

The adult horse normally has 36 to 44 adult teeth. Baby horses have 24 baby teeth that they lose to their permanent teeth. The set of 12 teeth in the front of the horse’s mouth are termed incisors. Proceeding away from the incisors a little ways up the horses jaw are the 4 teeth, termed canines. A little further up from the canine teeth, is the wolf tooth followed by 12 premolars, and finally 12 molars at the back of the jaw.

A common term used in horse teeth maintenance is called “floating” or “float”.  This means the teeth are unevenly worn due to diets consisting of grain, and hay. To read more about these please refer to “Don’t Forget To Float” article in EQUUS magazine [3].

References

1.) “Horse on a Handshake” by Elaine Pascoe, Horse & Rider Magazine, June 2000.
2.) “Heavenly Horses” by Healthy Pet, Summer 2006
3.) “Don’t Forget To Float” by Joanne Meszoly, EQUUS, September 2001, pp 38-46.