Dry mouth?

oscarwild

oscarwild

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Can anyone shed any light as to how you would know if your horse wasnt producing enough saliva? Because I was wondering if this is what my mare has :-/

She has been constantly choking on haylage and occassionally on hard feed. She has been scoped and they couldnt see anything. Scope only went halfway down and said if she keeps choking they will scope down to stomach. since the scope she has had haylage once when she spent the night inside due to losing a shoe. Normally out 24/7. She was fed soaked haylage and was fine.

I only put this together yesterday after riding yesterday after playing around. She is normally ridden in a loose ring french link and has always produced some saliva but recently she stopped and has produced none. So I rode her same bit but a warmer metal as it should encourage saliva. But you guessed it. It produced none and the bit came out her mouth as dry as it did when it went in.

Do you think she is having issues producing saliva hence the choking and the bit. As if so what could be causing it?

thanks :D
 
Firstly, always feed your feed soaked (if you're aren't already!) to avoid any future problems. Secondly, it's very unusal for a horse to have a dry mouth. She may not be mouthing the bit due to sore teeth, so worth checking. If she has a problem with her salivary glands they would be swollen (have a feel under the jaw just before the cheek bones). Have you checked to make sure she isn't dehydrated?

Hope this helps.
 
Yeah she always gets her feed soaked but its even wetter now. After all the problems.
No she not dehydrated but will check again when go to feed her later on. She doesnt drink the greatest deal of water. But my last horse had excessive drinking problems so I know how bad drinking issues can be. Will also check her glands later on when I go see her.

she had her teeth done a couple months ago after she started quidding and my vet and the vet who scoped her checked her teeth last week and this week to find no problem.
 
It does sound like there is an underlying problem that's upsetting her. My horse gets a dry mouth because he is a worrier. And I've managed to overcome it with the ridden firstly by giving him an apple whilst bitted before riding and secondly by riding him really quite round and forward, I also put a flash on and it's all encouraged him to mouth the bit more, he still gets it over showjumps though, he is not the easiest to ride round showjumping and is a bit green still so I'm hoping that will come. A dry mouth is a good sign that something is just not quite right, it's now your job to find out what. If only they could talk hey! The other problem wih a dry mouth is that they will eventually get sore in the corners of their mouths which is a nuisance in itself.
 
Yeah she had a sore mouth a couple weeks ago and my friend tried another bit in her and she hated it. I thought it was the bit. But perhaps it wasnt the blt so to speak. It could have been due to a dry mouth.

She does have a lump under her cheek bones but I cant tell if they have always been like that or not :-/ Think its the glands. First time I noticed it I did say to a friend who said she always had them. I was never sure. So might look into that aswell.
 
Vet coming out tomorrow.

Went to feed her tonight and her face is swollen. Told vet everything and she was given some danilion for the night and he will be first thing in the morning. So we can catch the blood tester people first thing in the morning with her bloods. As he doesnt want them sitting. He wants as fresh a sample as possible.

I am know quite worried about her as it really is sore for her and it could be part of the choking thing we will have to wait and see,
 
Yeah I hope she fine.

Here are some pics of the swellings that I sent over to my vet.

Photo0227.jpg


Photo0228.jpg


Photo0229.jpg


Any ideas are welcome.
 
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