Read an article recently that mentioned bloodless dehorning for cows. Anyone here know how to go about that? Our bull is not polled and occasionally we get a heifer that is horned. We don't worry too much about the bull calves because they don't have as long a life span in the scheme of things here on the farm. Noreen
If they are burned in the first couple of weeks of life there shouldn't be any blood. There is also a paste for dehorning calves. I don't know about adult dehorning though. I suppose banding the horn would be bloodless...
You arent going to do a bloodless dehorning. Paste works fair if you get it right. If you want to do an older animal, you are going to have to use a hacksaw or some OB wire. Get right on the base and go for it. The OB wire works best because the heat generated helps to cauterize the bleeding. You could use barnes dehorners if they arent too big and you are strong. Be sure to have a hemostat handy doing it this way. When you see the vein pumping out blood, grab hold of it and pull it til it snaps off. It then will snap back into the hole in which is was protruding from and stop bleeding. Either way you look at it, it will messy. I wouldnt band the horns, I have not seen any success with it. But then again, I havent seen too many try them.
Burning the buds when they're small is the best way in my opinion. You have to be careful with the paste not to get it on anything but the horn bud and then they can rub it off on something. Burning not really a pleasant thing to do but it's over in a couple of minutes and has to be done if you don't want horns.
We've never banded. We dehorned three cows two years ago..or rather we had Joe out to dehorn them. it was ugly and messy! All the more reason to do it when they are young.
Learn how to freeze them with Lidocaine or whatever your local vet can get you, then burn them off at 6-8 weeks with a Rhinehard electric dehorner or something else that will cauterize as you do it.That's about as clean and stress-free as you'll find
We have burned them, and of course had them dehorned at a slightly older age. The burning was bloodless for us, horn falls off after a week or more, and leaves good results. The older animals is the bloody part, and is harder, and yipeee, we have 4 to do this spring . Jeff
If you have access to horn irons, burning them would be best. We do hundreds a day in the spring. You really need to let them burn deep in. Hold them on for 30 seconds each side. Then the cone pops off and you should be good.
