Trimming feet-- how does your farm do it?

[Dusky Beauty]

Cow toes (not to be confused with camel toes ) are looking a little long at my place-- I'm also thinking about selling one of the girls, and I want to make sure all her regular maintenance is up to date before I do.

I guess trimming feet is a problem for some, but it's necessary, so lets share from the collective experience on the matter.

My vet (a dairy-raised kid) recommends having the cow stand on a block of wood and chiseling off the extra toe length-- my cow didn't care for it much though

We decided next time we were just going to use a sharp pair of hoof nippers and do her like we do the horse since she has nice ground manners if we don't annoy her for 20 minutes.

Do most people have to sedate? or do you put the animals in stantion? Do you call a farrier to do the deed?

[SpaceCadet12364]

We let our vet do it. He uses nippers. Takes about 5 min for all 4 feet. Or one of our friends does it for a living for the dairies. He uses a table that tilts. He does the entire dairy herd in about 3 days. That is 500-600 head.

[oregon woodsmok]

I've never trimmed cows or sheep. A good size patch of a large sized crushed rock at the gate they must go through to get to their evening feed keeps the hooves in good shape.

[ycanchu2]

I always thought long hooves on a cow was a sign of founder. I didn't know I needed to get them all up and trim them. I better get to work.

[kycrawler]

To just trim toe length a wood chisel and a block work fine . You can also use a sharp set of tree pruners . For a full trim on older cows I have a blade that goes in a 4.5 inch angle grinder and put them on a tilt table it doesn't take long at all . Mainly only use the grinder on some amish cows i trim for to fix lameness issues and foot rot/abcesses Making the cows walk across concrete helps alot and you mainly just have to trim toes on old cows

[happydog]

I asked at the feed store and they recommended a farrier who works on cows. He drove a half hour to get to our place, spent an hour wrestling with our cow who was NOT happy about the whole idea, and his fee was a whopping twenty bucks.

We called him to do our next cow and hers went a lot smoother. He just lifted her hoofs and used the nippers and then filed them. Well worth the $20.

[tinknal]

I've been around beef cattle my whole life and the only time I've seen hooves trimmed is for show or sale bulls.

[kycrawler]

Ive trimmed some amish holsteins that had hooves 10-12 inches long and curled allover cows had to learn to walk again when your done . most people around here trim their own show calves mainly only trim goats sheep and dairy cows .

[ksfarmer]

Originally Posted by tinknal

I've been around beef cattle my whole life and the only time I've seen hooves trimmed is for show or sale bulls.

Yep. The only beef cows I've seen that needed their hooves trimmed were ones which somehow had gotten too much grain and foundered.

[springvalley]

Very rare to trim hooves here, I have a long handled pair of trimmers if I need to. If you trim hooves alot, time to look into breeding for better feet. > Thanks Marc