'Cause I'm a Dentist! And a Success!

As you may remember, one of the possible causes for Junior's slight weight loss over the winter was a need for a tooth float. His teeth may have been making it difficult for him to properly chew and therefore digest his food. Today we finally had that done and the visit from the Equine Dentist came with a surprise...

Do you know what that is? I sure wouldn't have known, and I'm kinda grossed out that it's sitting on my glove. It's a tiny wolf tooth that had not yet been removed. He had a scar from where the other one had been taken out, but this one had not come in all the way and was just sitting there right under the skin, right where bits go. This may partially explain his tendency to become a giraffe when initially asked to take contact. Or it may not really have bothered him, but the Dentist advised removal and it came out quickly and easily. It may have been there for years, or who knows. But it's out now. I felt less sympathetic about putting him through all of this today because I myself had a root canal on Tuesday. I feel your pain, buddy.

There he is in the clamp getting the points filed down. I was able to feel his pointy teeth before the filing and then the smoother teeth after the procedure. They were not terrible but they did need to be done.

The other informative part of the visit was the explanation of what's going on with Junior's middle incisors. His bout of cribbing (of which there has been zero evidence of since we've moved, btw) has caused damage to his teeth and his left one is actually dead and decaying. The right is a little better off, but not much.

Now you can see in these photos, first from the first winter I had him, which was before he started the cribbing, that the middle incisors are shorter than the others. Then on the right is from this winter post-cribbing. The Dentist explained something about how they once were growing differently than the others and so there was some inconsistent wear. The combination of that and the cribbing caused the teeth to essentially die. He showed me how he could stick a needle up inside the right one and there was no reaction from Junebug so we know the tooth is dead. For the time being there is nothing to be done. He doesn't seem to show any discomfort from it and there is no swelling or other evidence of a root abscess, but he told me what to look for so we can take care of it if it happens. Unfortunately, eventually the teeth might become abscessed or fractured and need to be removed.

Aside from the now increased guilt I feel for ever putting him in a situation that caused him to crib, can you just imagine how much it will add to his personality when he is missing his two front teeth?!?!?