With their shaggy long coats and the scruffy look of free-roaming horses, it was easy to see that the little Brumby youngsters I was visiting had been running wild in our Australian High Country only weeks prior to their first dental exam! I had been called in to treat them, and while I have worked on newly captured Brumbies before, it still amazed me how impeccably behaved these young horses were during every aspect of my treating them. While curious yet cautious at first, they took to ‘domestic’ equine care well as we proceeded gently. Of course, in the bush, these horses would have fended for themselves, probably by chewing on tree bark and sticks.
Some of the Brumbies were just babies and too young to have the dental speculum on. So instead of frightening them with an odd metal contraption around their head, we set them up to have a good experience and gave them only a small rasp of their teeth while wearing their headstall attached to a soft hold of the lead rope. In this group, there were four. Some were a few months older than others and one turned out to be a few years older than we’d originally thought; he was just small like a colt. The older guys had the dental speculum applied and took it in their stride—no sedation, no crushes and no force. Once they realised what was being asked of them they actually relaxed into the experience.
Then of course there is always going to be one who needs a tooth extracted! In this instance, our little tank of a man stood perfectly still for what was fortunately a rather quick and painless extraction of a baby tooth.
It’s these moments in a dental technician’s career that leave you speechless, as it’s just so rewarding and special to experience first-hand how truly adaptable and amazing our wild horses are.