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1 of 3 Premium Clicks used this month SUBSCRIBE Print + Online Subscriber Activation | Register x Forgot Password | Need an Account? e-edition | subscribe | newsletter | deals Classifieds Jobs Autos Real Estate FEATURED » NEWS NOW Grants Pass teacher pleads not guilty to sex charges ... Two women sought in Rogue River robbery ... Wilson Elementary on lockdown as police seek robbery suspects ... Grants Pass teacher pleads not guilty to sex charges ... Two women sought in Rogue River robbery ... Wilson Elementary on lockdown as police seek robbery suspects ... Horse sense: equine dentistry By BILL KETTLER,Mail Tribune MailTribune.com By BILL KETTLER,Mail Tribune Posted Feb. 17, 2006 at 2:00 AM Updated Feb 16, 2011 at 10:34 AM By BILL KETTLER,Mail Tribune Posted Feb. 17, 2006 at 2:00 AM Updated Feb 16, 2011 at 10:34 AM » Social News Beamer feels groggy, and it's been hard to hold his head up ever since somebody stuck him with a needle. There's a steel clamp holding his mouth open, and a man he's never seen just stuck his hand in his mouth. Now this stranger is feeling his teeth. The ridges are really washboarded, Steve Burgess says, running his fingers along the big molars at the back of the horse's mouth. The softer parts of the teeth are wearing down before the harder parts. Burgess is a horse dentist, and Beamer, this 8-year-old paint horse with blue eyes, needs help. We're going to try to get his teeth back to what they'd be like if he was in a natural environment, Burgess says. That means grinding down the high spots that Beamer would wear away on his own if he were out grazing 18 hours a day ' the way that horses fed before humans domesticated them and started giving them soft hay once or twice a day. — Their teeth are made to be eating sagebrush and other junk, Burgess says as he attaches a grinding tool to a battery-powered motor. If they're not grinding the way that Mother Nature intended them it just goofs things up. He puts the grinder inside Beamer's mouth and starts taking down the sharp points on the molars. The horse doesn't care much for the high-speed vibrations inside his mouth. It's all right, Buddy, Burgess says, comforting the horse as he works. You're doing a fine job. Burgess is a modern-day practitioner of an ancient art. He says people have been working on horses' teeth since the earliest days of the horse-human relationship. Everybody thinks this is something new, the Eagle Point man says, but ever since people domesticated horses they've been figuring out what to do with their teeth. We just have a little nicer equipment. Horse dentistry was a common occupation in the era when horses were mostly work animals, and people had to keep them in good shape. There were hundreds of guys doing this in the '30s and '40s, Burgess says. These days he's one of a few dozen certified equine dentists in the United States. A visit from Burgess will cost & 36;150 to & 36;180, depending on the job. Before anesthesia and power tools, equine dentists did their work with muscle while somebody else restrained the horse. A hand file (known in the trade as a float) took down the high spots and evened up the teeth. About the same time horses were being replaced by machinery, veterinarians became more common, and they became the primary providers of dental care for horses. Equine dentists became increasingly rare, but they never quite disappeared. Burgess, 45, came to the trade by accident. He hurt his knee in a ranch accident while working as a cowboy in Eastern Oregon and happened to meet an equine dentist while he was laid up. He invited me to ride along with him, Burgess recalls. I rode with him for six or eight months and I just got interested in doing it. I didn't know much about horse's teeth, he says, and I heard his customers talking about how much better their horses were doing after he saw them. Burgess enrolled at the Academy of Equine Dentistry in Glenns Ferry, Idaho, one of the schools that kept the trade alive. He studied equine anatomy and the biomechanics of a horse's mouth as well as the ways that different shapes of horse heads contribute to dental problems. They have hundreds of skulls there, he says. You can see every variation you can imagine. He also learned that any number of horse problems can be traced to their mouth, an area of equine anatomy that many horse owners tend to ignore. If people can't see their horse's teeth, they assume everything is OK, he says. Many equine dental problems can be traced to the unnatural feeding habits of domesticated horses. In nature, horses tear off grass with their big front incisors and grind it down with side-to-side chewing of the molars at the back of the jaw. When horses eat soft hay, none of the teeth do all the work they were designed to do. Incisors don't tear enough, and molars don't grind enough. Problems are exacerbated because horses' teeth keep growing to replace the material that should be wearing down. Sharp edges on the teeth can make eating painful, causing a horse to lose weight or waste food, says Annette Brophy, who boards Beamer at her Quarry Hill Farm outside Phoenix. You know what it's like if you've got a sore mouth, Brophy says. You're not inclined to eat with gusto. Burgess says dentistry for horses isn't as painful as it is for humans. The nerves in horses' teeth are far below the area where a dentist works. A light dose of anesthesia helps the horse tolerate the dentist, but Burgess says the horse really decides what happens. If they don't want to let you do it, you can't give them enough drugs to make them let you do it, he says. A week after Burgess's visit, Brophy says Beamer seems to have responded to the treatment. He's eating a lot better, she says. Burgess travels as far as California, Montana and Idaho to work on horses' teeth. He says some of his patients are skittish or uneasy when he sees them for the first time, but many seem to remember that he made them feel better. The second time you see them it's usually a breeze, he says. Vet must supervise 'lay' dentist Equine dentists generally limit their practice to shaping and trimming teeth, but they may also do extractions. Each state regulates the practice of equine dentistry within its boundaries. Oregon is one of many states in which equine dentists may work only under the supervision of an attending veterinarian. It's a relationship that generally works well, says Elizabeth Damon, an Eagle Point vet. My specialty is large animals, Damon says. I don't want to specialize in teeth. There's enough vets who want us to come and work with them, horse dentist Steve Burgess says. Burgess will talk about equine dentistry at two locations this weekend: At — p.m. Saturday at J and P Ranch, 1524 Dry Creek Road, Eagle Point. Call 218- 5403 or 830-0166 for information. At noon Sunday at Quarry Hill Farm, 7017 Dark Hollow Road, near Phoenix. Space is limited, and reservations are required. Call 535-7307 for information and reservations. Horse sense: equine dentistry"[email protected]. By BILL KETTLER,Mail Tribune MailTribune.com By BILL KETTLER,Mail Tribune Posted Feb. 17, 2006 at 2:00 AM Updated Feb 16, 2011 at 10:34 AM » STAY INFORMED Email NewsLetter Sign Up Today Sign up for our newsletter and have the top headlines from your community delivered right to your inbox. Southern Oregon Directory Featured Businesses Loading... 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