My horse has all of a sudden started to act a little funny like she is going to buck. Of course I got off and checked everything and all seems well. She is a good mannered lady and usually doesn't give any issues.

Maybe she was just having a bad day. But a friend told me something he was reading about wolf teeth in mares? I have never heard of them? I haven't had any time to poke around the net and read about them. Is it just like hooks or floating?

I hate when I am novice about something.

When does your mare buck?
When you first get on or during transitions?

Wolf teeth are small teeth in the upper jaw located just before the premolars.
They can interfere with the bit causing some training problems.
They are easily extracted by a veterinarian.

We had a similar problem with our mare years ago. When we started riding her on a regular basis, she began fighting with you and would rear when you ask her to do something. Like you, we looked her over from head to toe. I decided we would float her teeth. When we got in there her teeth were sharp but we also notice that she had both upper wolft teeth. They both had lots of extra gum tissue around them and they were extremely sharp. Once we pulled them and gave her a few days off for it to heal, we started riding her again and she has never reared since.

Mares, I have found often get over looked. In boys they normally get pulled when we knock them out to castrate them. Since fillies don't need anything done with them we tend to forget to check them. It is recommended to float a horse for the first time at 2 years just before they go into training and at that time the wolf teeth can be removed. Young horses will almost need done yearly until they are 5 years when they will have their full set of adult teeth in. Normally after age 5 you can go every other year. Unless the horse has a dental condition like a miss alignment of some sort. Dental care has come a long way in the past few years with all the power tools that are now available. THey do a better job, and are easier on the horse and humans.

Hope this helps.

This is quite interesting to me too as I was told by my vet that wolf teeth only appear in males, I'll need to go check my girls, we have a couple we are getting ready for driving training.

I'm new to the group and am enjoying already the wealth of shared knowlege around here
thanks. Ruth

I read someplace once that mares didn't have wolf teeth either but whoever wrote that book didn't know what they were talking about. I had all my mares checked last year including ones I figured didn't have any sence when I bought them they had already been ridden for a few years but everyone of them had wolf teeth, it was a total surprise to me lol
Cathy C

It is pretty amazing how many mares do have wolf teeth, and it goes un noticed until there is a problem. About 4 of the mares I have had over the years have had wolf teeth. The one mare had been in training prior to us getting her. The trainer told the owner that she was not cut out for reining and to get rid of her, along with another gelding she had. The trainer complained about head set issues amongest other things. We ended up with the horses. After I rode the mare a realize what she was doing, I checked her mouth and sure enough there they were. One was still completely in tacked and the other was broke. Gelding had both of his also. Had their teeth done and no head issues or any other problems. It is amazing what problems those darn little teeth can cause.