Question and Answer Forum (Nov. 2008)
"Salivation at the Mouth"
Question:
What does foaming at the mouth indicate? Does it mean the horse is distressed? Supple? Stiff?
Answer:
I don't think that there is any evidence that moderate salivation comes from distress. On the other hand, experience shows that a dry mouth indicates that the horse is still not supple enough, especially in the poll and throat latch area. In addition, there is often still stiffness in one or both hips. Sometimes the base of the neck is rubbery and disconnected in these cases, which prevents the horse from stretching into the rein contact. They may "round" the neck, but they also shorten it with dropped withers, and they tend to be too far behind the vertical. Their back is dropped and they have withdrawn behind the contact. To an uneducated eye, these horses can still look more or less correct (because the head is down), but there is no stretch of the top line, there is no bascule, the correct musculature is missing in the back and in the topline. When you ride a horse like that, it doesn't feel very pleasant, either. Of course, there are variations on this scenario where the mouth is dry as well. If you analyse the situation closely, you will typically find stiffness and/or lack of connectivity in certain areas of the horse's body.
Horses tend to salivate first on the stiffer side, where they make (sometimes too much) contact with the rein, while they tend to stay dry on the hollow side, where they avoid the rein contact. As long as the horse braces his poll and jaw on one side, he is less likely to salivate there. The salivation is caused by a pressure on the saliva glands by the jowl rim and the neck musculature when the horse stretches the arched neck forward into the contact and flexes the poll, AND relaxes the poll and jaw (NB: the poll can be flexed without being relaxed). Conversely, the salivation causes the horse to move his tongue and swallow, which in turn helps the relaxation of the jaw, poll, and throat latch area. When you straighten the horse so that he starts to stretch his hollow, i.e. contracted side, you will start to see foam developing on that side as well. The moderate foaming of the mouth is generally a sign that the energy impulses of the hind legs are traveling along the spine to the mouth without getting stuck in stiff muscles and without getting lost in false bends.
- Thomas Ritter
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