Horse Teeth: Dental Care, Floating, and How to Tell a Horse's Age by Its Teeth

By Gayle Woods Editors Updated 5 min read

Horses evolved to spend most of the day grinding tough grass, and their teeth are built for it. That same design means domestic horses, which often eat softer feeds in fewer meals, develop dental problems that need regular attention. A horse with sore teeth can lose weight, choke, colic, or fight the bit, and owners often blame something else first.

How horse teeth work

An adult horse has 36 to 44 teeth:

  • 12 incisors at the front, for biting off grass.
  • 24 cheek teeth (premolars and molars) at the back, for grinding.
  • Canine teeth ("tushes"), usually in males, in the gap between incisors and cheek teeth.
  • Wolf teeth, small, shallow-rooted teeth just in front of the upper cheek teeth in some horses.

Each tooth is very long, much of it hidden in the jaw. Horse teeth don't keep growing in the way rodent teeth do. Instead, the long tooth slowly erupts out of the jaw throughout life, about an eighth of an inch a year, while chewing wears the top down. By the time a horse is in its late 20s or 30s, some teeth may be worn down to the roots and fall out.

The upper jaw is wider than the lower jaw. As the horse grinds side to side, the cheek teeth wear unevenly, leaving sharp edges, or points, on the outside of the upper teeth and the inside of the lower teeth. Those points can cut the cheeks and tongue.

What floating is

Floating means filing down sharp points and uneven surfaces on the cheek teeth so the horse can chew comfortably and evenly. The name comes from the flat file, or float, traditionally used. Many vets now use motorized tools.

A good dental exam involves:

  • Sedation, so the horse stays relaxed and safe.
  • A full-mouth speculum, which holds the mouth open so the vet can see and feel every tooth.
  • A bright light and a dental mirror to check for cracks, gaps, loose teeth, gum disease and decay.
  • Floating where needed, and attention to other problems such as hooks, ramps, wave mouth and retained baby teeth.

Floating the teeth too aggressively can do harm, so the goal is to correct problems, not grind teeth flat.

Signs of dental problems

  • Dropping feed, or dropping half-chewed wads of hay (called quidding)
  • Eating slowly, or tilting the head while chewing
  • Weight loss even with enough feed
  • Long pieces of hay or whole grain in the manure
  • Bad breath, or a smelly discharge from one nostril
  • Swelling on the face or jaw
  • Head tossing, fussing with the bit, or resisting the bridle
  • Repeated choke or colic

Many horses hide mild dental pain, so regular exams catch problems before you see these signs.

How often to schedule dental exams

Age How often Why
Foals and yearlings At least once in the first year Check for problems with alignment or development
2 to 5 years Every 6 months Baby teeth ("caps") are being replaced by adult teeth
6 to 20 years Once a year Routine floating and checks
Over 20 years Every 6 to 12 months Worn, loose and missing teeth become common

Horses in work with a bit, and horses with known problems, may need more frequent checks.

Wolf teeth and the bit

Wolf teeth sit right where the bit rests, and some horses resent the bit touching them. Many vets remove them, especially in young horses starting under saddle. The procedure is quick under sedation. If a horse fusses with its mouth, have the teeth checked before you change bits. See how horse bits work.

Feeding a horse with bad teeth

When an older horse can't chew hay properly anymore, switch to feeds it can manage:

  • Soaked hay cubes or hay pellets
  • Soaked beet pulp
  • A complete senior feed, fed at the full rate on the label

Soak them into a mash. Dry pellets and cubes are a choke risk for horses that can't chew well. See senior horse care.

How to tell a horse's age by its teeth

The front teeth, the incisors, change in predictable ways as a horse ages. Estimates are fairly accurate up to about age 10, then get rougher. Diet, breed and individual differences all affect wear, so treat any estimate as a range.

Up to age 5: baby teeth to adult teeth

  • Birth to about 9 months: baby (deciduous) incisors come in, the middle ones first.
  • About 2 1/2 years: the two middle adult incisors on top and bottom replace the baby teeth.
  • About 3 1/2 years: the next pair comes in.
  • About 4 1/2 years: the corner incisors come in.
  • 5 years: a full mouth of adult teeth. A horse with all adult incisors is called "full-mouthed."

Adult teeth are larger, more rectangular and more yellow than the small, white baby teeth.

6 to 10 years: cups and stars

A young adult incisor has a deep dark hollow on its biting surface, called the cup. As the tooth wears, the cups wear away, starting with the middle teeth.

  • Around 6: cups disappear from the bottom middle incisors.
  • Around 7: cups gone from the next pair.
  • Around 8: cups gone from the bottom corner incisors.
  • Around 8 to 10: a dark line or spot called the dental star appears in front of where the cup was.

A small hook may appear on the upper corner incisor around age 7, and again in the early teens.

10 and older: Galvayne's groove and tooth shape

Galvayne's groove is a brown line that runs down the outside of the upper corner incisors.

  • Around 10: it appears at the gum line.
  • Around 15: it reaches about halfway down the tooth.
  • Around 20: it reaches the bottom.
  • Around 25: it has disappeared from the top half.
  • Around 30: it's gone.

Not every horse has a clear Galvayne's groove, so use it alongside other clues.

The shape of the biting surface also changes: oval in young adults, rounder in the early teens, triangular in the late teens, and longer front-to-back in old age. The angle of the incisors becomes more slanted with age, so an old horse's teeth stick forward when you look from the side.

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Frequently Asked Questions