If you keep goats you have to decide, horns or no horns? You can't really mix horned goats with dehorned because they aren't evenly matched the horned goats will always win any battle. Horns get stuck in wire fences and they are at the height of a human eye. If you want to breed and sell kids horns are drawback.
Watching our Vet "dis-budding" the kids this afternoon I did wonder if the disadvantages of having horned goats were out weighed by the trauma to the goat and its owner. There's a second trauma; the bill for the drugs and the Vet's time.
The horns grow from two little buds on the forehead and to stop them from growing the buds have to be removed. Normal procedure, in the UK, is for a Vet to do the operation because the kids skull is quite thin and its a potentially dangerous and painful op. A red hot iron is used to cauterize and burn out the buds. This may sound and look barbaric but the Vet does use anaesthetics, he's skilled and its a quick procedure.
They were a bit dopey when they woke up but bouncing around again within an hour. I let the Veterinary nurse hold them. I didn't want them associating me with the day's events.
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| Preparing for the op on the workshop bench |
The horns grow from two little buds on the forehead and to stop them from growing the buds have to be removed. Normal procedure, in the UK, is for a Vet to do the operation because the kids skull is quite thin and its a potentially dangerous and painful op. A red hot iron is used to cauterize and burn out the buds. This may sound and look barbaric but the Vet does use anaesthetics, he's skilled and its a quick procedure.
They were a bit dopey when they woke up but bouncing around again within an hour. I let the Veterinary nurse hold them. I didn't want them associating me with the day's events.
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