Banding Horns?

[CarolynRenee]

I started out with a hornless goat herd. We disbud our kids, even the Boers. But then I got some good deals on a few other goats, but they have horns....and I quickly realized why I didn't want horns on my goats.

There are two younger goats I was thinking of banding as their horns are not very thick at the skull. The older Boer buck and older Boer doe I don't think I would consider good banding candidates as their horns are pretty thick at the base.

Without getting into a "horns vs. no horns" debate, can anyone tell me if they have ever banded horns of a goat to remove them, with success? We had a Nigerian Dwarf buck that had a pretty nasty scur and we used the castrating bands on it & it fell off after a while, but I've never done it on a "full" horn.

[Alice In TX/MO]

If it's a full grown, full size, firmly attached horn, I wouldn't do it. I've done scurs, even a couple of large ones, and the experience was dreadful for the goat.

[mygoat]

I havent' done it, but I have heard either story - they're fine, or they were put through horrible pain.

Me, I'd breed them and plan on keeping a disbudded offspring.

[mrs whodunit]

I bandon pretty much any size goat horn.

Big horns I take a chainsaw file to make a slight grove to hold on the band. I also use 2 bands for big horns and cross them. They take a bit longer but it works well. Sometimes they will bleed a bit more but some type of blood stop powder will take care of that.

[CarolynRenee]

Thanks all!