# Dehorning Jersey Calf



## cjc (Dec 2, 2016)

Well, I have my first Jersey calf as many of you know. He is about 2 months old now. I was given advice from the man I bought his dam from to use the paste to take off his horns when they started coming in. As soon as I saw the buds coming up I put the paste on. Now these horns seem to just be coming in bigger and bigger. Do I put the paste on again? I almost debate just letting his horns grow in but it would be my first cow with horns. I should mention he is not long for the world...1.5 years max, he's freezer meat. I thought I would just let his mother raise him but she is my nurse cow and this new jersey baby isn't the friendliest guy. Not aggressive at all but he wont let me grab him like my other calves. Because I have so many calves right now I am only keeping the calves that are not head shy from this season. What are your thoughts on this? Do I use the paste again? Do I try and get them off some other way? Do I let the horns grow in? Sorry if this is a stupid question but I've only ever owned polled breeds!


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## Green Acres Farm (Dec 2, 2016)

I do not have cows or know really anything about cows, but dehorning paste is strongly discouraged in the goat world. If the paste gets onto his eyes, he can go blind, if it gets onto his mother, her udder can be burned, etc. In my Goat Medicine book, it shows neocropsy photos of a kid's _brain_ that was burned and damaged from the paste. 

Have you looked into an electric disbudder?


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## Simpleterrier (Dec 2, 2016)

I leave the horns on all my animals. I haven't seen a reason to remove them. I just got a Holstein steer processed and he had horns. He was around 18 months old didn't have a problem with them. All my goats keep their horns. I had some Nubians dehorned years ago and the never did act right afterwards they were burnt off. I have helped dehorn slot of dairy calves but never with paste but they were gonna be milk cows. I know others have different ideas I just haven't seen the need to dehorn


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## cjc (Dec 2, 2016)

@Green Acres Farm interesting I had not heard all of those facts. Our neighour has an electric disbudder but I don't want to buy one as this will likely be my only horned calf. Is he too old now for that? Now that his horns are already up a bit? I kept him away from the herd and his mother for 8 hours. He was not happy! But I needed to protect him and her and that was what was recommended on the packaging

@Simpleterrier I am leaning towards just leaving them on. He's not aggressive at all but I have heard Jersey steers can be pretty hard to handle. I did band him and I pat him a bit each day so hopefully he stays somewhat mellow.


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## Simpleterrier (Dec 2, 2016)

Jerseys are jerseys they are rotten and nosey. The meat can also be different than what ur used to


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## Green Acres Farm (Dec 2, 2016)

cjc said:


> @Green Acres Farm interesting I had not heard all of those facts. Our neighour has an electric disbudder but I don't want to buy one as this will likely be my only horned calf. Is he too old now for that? Now that his horns are already up a bit? I kept him away from the herd and his mother for 8 hours. He was not happy! But I needed to protect him and her and that was what was recommended on the packaging


I have no idea. I saw a video of calf disbudding, and there was a little stub. 

Maybe @farmerjan would know if you posted pics?


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## farmerjan (Dec 3, 2016)

I am not a good one for dehorning.  I won't use the paste and don't have the electric disbudder.  I do have a retired vet friend that does my females. We put them in the chute, He gives them a novacaine type shot at the base of the horns.  Then an old trick that he does it to tie a baling string around the base real tight to help cut the blood flow then we do it the old fashioned way with the cutters when they are about 6-8 months.  Yes it is a little bloody.  They don't feel it though if the shots are right.  They basically just stand there with their head tied to the side to do one then switched to the other side to do the other. We leave the baling string tied tight for 24 hours or so, I put them back in the chute & then I take it off.  We pack the hole  with gauze.  It keeps the dirt/hay etc. out.  We only do this late in the fall after fly season, or early enough in the spring before it gets too warm, like march.  I have never had any problem with infections, flys/maggots or anything.  We also give them a penicillin shot as a preventative.  Had a bad experience with the paste so don't use it.  ALSO, ONLY do them when the sign is in the thighs or when the moon is in the last quarter going to the new moon.  Blood flow is less when it is waning.  Now I am breeding my jerseys to polled bulls AI so it is less of a concern.  I don't usually do the steers since they are for my own use or sale.  Did have a jersey/holstein cow that had horns and after about 3 years she started to use them on other cows so they got taken off.  It was a bit of an ordeal, but it sure changed her attitude. 
I think the electric disbudder has to be done when they are pretty small and soft but I don't have any experience with it.
Jersey steers are not any harder to handle than any other steers.  It's the bull s that can get mean but not all do.  I was raising 4-10 at a time and selling the meat (as halves) so have had quite a few.  Got tired of people backing out so don't raise as many to sell direct but usually have one or two if anyone wants one. Several of them were actually more pets than the heifers.  Don't get into any kind of head pushing/butting with them as they will get more aggressive.  It's natures way of them playing and asserting dominance.  If he doesn't seem to be pushing around with his head, leaving them is not a big deal.  If he gets to using them, they can always be taken off when he is bigger.  Since you tried the paste, they may not grow all that much past a certain point, but I can't say that for sure.  If you do breed the cow back AI just ask ahead for the AI tech to get a  polled jersey  bull.  There are several.  If you have a choice also ask for an A2A2 bull.  That type milk is supposed to be more digestible for humans, you can look it up on the internet and all the bull stud books with the available bulls now list the type milk they have the genetics for.


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## greybeard (Dec 3, 2016)

You can also band the the horns if they aren't too big, tho I have been reading more and more people are banding much older cattle that have substantial horn growth--you just need bigger bands for them and probably will have to use duct tape to hold the bands in place. 

The thing about the 'To dehorn or not dehorn' question, and the 'you can always take them off later if it's problematic" is that once something bad happens, it's too late, and that bad thing can happen dang quick.  Once the buds start getting longer, it won't take him long to learn what those hookers are for, and at the very least, he will use them to get and keep any other animals out of the feed trough or hay rack.

I have only 2 horned cows now. They are gentle and have never given ME any trouble, but they get the best of the hay and more feed than any of the rest of my beefmasters.

Another problem is the horn sheath. If they get  hung up in something by the horns, there is a very good possibility of the outer layer of that horn being pulled off, which will result in blood oozing out and attracting parasites. I had it happen to a bull I once owned. Eveidently, he pulled it off while scratching against an oak tree. I found blood on the tree trunk and for several weeks afterward, Every time he passed by there, he would paw the ground, snort and bellow, and you didn't want to be anywhere near him. He grew wheels when he injured his reproductive plumbing and when the 2 cows I have get replaced, they will be last horned ones I ever have. I use a polled bull to dehorn calves with now.





I really recommend you have him dehorned.
I have never used the paste, but back when we raised horned herefords, we dehorned lots of them the old way--with Keystone dehorners. Keystones are a bloody messy way to do it, and pretty painful to the animal, and our head gate ran red with blood. Most folks nowadays use the dehorn bands or a Barnes type tool.  The Barnes tool cuts them off near the poll, but I have seen some real butcher jobs if ya get too deep with it--it kinda 'scoops' the horn out and some people get too far down into the sinus cavity.
If you can't do it yourself, get a vet to do it now while he's young. A vet will likely use ob saw wire or Barnes if the horns are small and lidocaine injections. (10% lido here requires a vet prescription) I've done both barnes and ob wire in the last few years--prefer the ob wire. (that saw wire is not as easy as it looks--your arms will get tired and the smell is unpleasant.)

There was at one time, a very good Farmer Kitty cattle dehorning tutorial here at BYH (maybe a sticky) but for some reason,  the writer heavily redacted, edited it and I can no longer even find it. I think there were some complaints about it's very descriptive nature. Animal husbandry is often not very "emotionally digestable", but neccessary nonetheless.
Here's one on goats--might be applicable:
http://www.backyardherds.com/resources/horns-dis-bud-polled.31/
another on cattle:
http://calfology.com/library/wiki/dehorning-techniques-and-complications


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## cjc (Dec 5, 2016)

Thanks you guys! I am going to have the guy I bought his dam from (a neighbor) come over and access this for me. I am sort of stuck between do I do it or not. The only reason I am thinking no is he is going to be beef in a years time, but he also loves head butting his mom when they play!


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## jhm47 (Dec 6, 2016)

Dehorn him!  I've seen some mighty gruesome results from horned cattle.  They don't need to be trying to hurt you, just playing, and can cause some awful damage in an instant.  Believe me, as an EMT, I know what can happen.


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## cjc (Dec 22, 2016)

jhm47 said:


> Dehorn him!  I've seen some mighty gruesome results from horned cattle.  They don't need to be trying to hurt you, just playing, and can cause some awful damage in an instant.  Believe me, as an EMT, I know what can happen.



We did it. Your words stuck with me. I had a friend come over and he removed them. God it was gory though but I just have a weak stomach. He used some sort of tool to cut them off then burned it. He knocked him out thank goodness. But wow, I would not do that on my own. I think that just cured me of all horned breeds! Just felt bad for the little guy but as soon as he woke up he was up on his feet and ready to go back out to the pasture. He is acting totally normal now.


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## OneFineAcre (Dec 22, 2016)

We were at some friends when they disbudded a jersey.

I forgot I had Pictures.


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## cjc (Dec 22, 2016)

Oh god I hate this! I am way too much of a softy! I even laid our sweet jersey calf down on a blanket when he was out cold. The guy laughed at me but I felt terrible.


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## jhm47 (Dec 23, 2016)

NOBODY likes to cause pain or harm to their animals!  The fact is that we must be responsible for the safety and well-being of ourselves, our family and our animals.  I know how I would feel if one of my cattle were to injure one of my children or grandchildren.  The simple fact is that cattle are incredibly strong, fast, and often unpredictable.  These characteristics make them a danger to themselves and the people around them.  Eliminating horns doesn't make them perfectly safe, but it does eliminate one element of danger, much like wearing a seatbelt while you're driving.  Good job!  You are a responsible person in my opinion!


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## cjc (Dec 23, 2016)

jhm47 said:


> NOBODY likes to cause pain or harm to their animals!  The fact is that we must be responsible for the safety and well-being of ourselves, our family and our animals.  I know how I would feel if one of my cattle were to injure one of my children or grandchildren.  The simple fact is that cattle are incredibly strong, fast, and often unpredictable.  These characteristics make them a danger to themselves and the people around them.  Eliminating horns doesn't make them perfectly safe, but it does eliminate one element of danger, much like wearing a seatbelt while you're driving.  Good job!  You are a responsible person in my opinion!



Yes I totally agree. I am also not the most sophisticated cattle handler so it was the right choice. But to avoid this in the future there will likely be no more jersey calves for me haha! I am going to breed his mother to a black angus but I was told it is still a 50/50 chance for horns.


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## farmerjan (Dec 23, 2016)

No, the chance is not 50/50.  The polled gene is dominant so you are most likely to get a polled calf.  Every one of my jersey angus x calves is polled.  If you want a jersey calf,  simply use a polled jersey bull.  Again, the chance of a horned calf is like 1% or less.  I bought several jersey bull calves off a farmer several years ago, all out of a polled jersey bull, AI bred, and every one was polled.  There are ways to get around the horns. 
That said we have several longhorn crosses and WANT the horns.  The horns are also more popular in areas where there are large predators to deal with, like wolves, as the cows will get defensive as they should.  In an all horned herd, the cows seldom use the horns against other cows as they know they can get jabbed back.. The problem being that a few with horns will use them on the ones without.  Have 3 that will get dehorned here soon as they are using them against the polled herd mates.  Boy do they get a come uppence when they go to use them and there are no horns....I laugh.....and then they sometimes get some push backs, so serves them right.


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## jhm47 (Dec 23, 2016)

If you use a homozygous polled bull of any breed, you will get 100% polled calves.  If you use a heterozygous polled bull on horned cows, you will get 50-50% polled/horned.  All registered Angus bulls are homozygous polled, as are many bulls of other breeds.  Personally, I use only homozygous polled bulls, and never have to dehorn a calf.  My cousin is less careful in his bull selection, and gets about half horned calves.  I hate it when I have to help him work his calves.  He just bought a bull calf from me, so hopefully he will be getting fewer horned calves.


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## Green Acres Farm (Dec 24, 2016)

farmerjan said:


> No, the chance is not 50/50.  The polled gene is dominant so you are most likely to get a polled calf.  Every one of my jersey angus x calves is polled.  If you want a jersey calf,  simply use a polled jersey bull.  Again, the chance of a horned calf is like 1% or less.  I bought several jersey bull calves off a farmer several years ago, all out of a polled jersey bull, AI bred, and every one was polled.  There are ways to get around the horns.
> That said we have several longhorn crosses and WANT the horns.  The horns are also more popular in areas where there are large predators to deal with, like wolves, as the cows will get defensive as they should.  In an all horned herd, the cows seldom use the horns against other cows as they know they can get jabbed back.. The problem being that a few with horns will use them on the ones without.  Have 3 that will get dehorned here soon as they are using them against the polled herd mates.  Boy do they get a come uppence when they go to use them and there are no horns....I laugh.....and then they sometimes get some push backs, so serves them right.


I don't know anything thing about cows, but what if the cow she is talking about is heterozygous for the polled gene? That would be 50/50 chance if breeding to a horned one, right?


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## greybeard (Dec 24, 2016)

An animal can have one of three combinations for the polled/horned gene:

PP = homozygous polled means this animal has no horns, an all offspring from the animal will be born without horns
Pp = heterozygous polled means this animal does not have horns, but offspring may or may not have horns depending on their mate
pp = born with horns

If you’re starting with only horned animals in your herd, the figures below demonstrate your results mating cows to a polled sire. The table #1 illustrates that a homozygous polled bull bred to a horned cow will result in 100% hornless offspring. The table #2 illustrates that a heterozygous polled sire bred to a horned cow will result in only 50% polled offspring.   
#1






#2





But, just because a sire (or dam) is polled doesn't mean either is Homozygous polled.


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## farmerjan (Dec 24, 2016)

I wasn't thinking about the homo-  hetero- zygous aspect when I wrote my post.  Since cjc has angus, they are homozygous, the calf will be polled if bred to the jersey.  If  she breeds to a polled jersey, it should be polled.  I am pretty sure they are also homo but haven't followed up on that so maybe not all are.  But every calf that I have seen, and had, from a polled jersey bull breeding, has been polled when used on a horned jersey cow.  Unless you do the testing then a horned animal is assumed by most to be  homo for the horned gene.  Now if you have two heterozygous animals,  IN THEORY, you will actually get  25 % polled homo, 50 % horned hetero and 25 % horned homo. So 75% will have horns but not all will pass on the horned gene.  It gets even more complicated than that in the ensuing generations.
Same as for sexed semen; in theory you have a 90% + chance of getting a heifer calf if you use sexed semen.  Tell that to people like me who are walking Murphy's Law.  Bred one jersey to sexed semen....3 out of 4 calves were bulls.  Bred another to sexed semen, all 3 were bulls...  I get everybody else's 10% bulls LOL....
The rule of thumb is that if the cow has horns, she will have a horned calf  unless bred to a polled breed.  AI catalogs will state if a bull is homo or hetero for the polled gene and also the big thing is homo or hetero for the black gene since so many in this country are so "black cattle" oriented.  That whole thing came from anything black being called a "black angus" to capitalize on the "angus beef"  thing.  There never used to be black limousins, or  black simmentals and now there is black in everything. Even black herefords.... I prefer the red cattle for grazing in the heat, they can withstand it better, but black sells here better and believe me it is heartbreaking to see a really good red calf bring .20-.30  less per pound because it is red.  And bad for the bottom line when 2 side by side cows, one is making you $100 to $200 less because one has a red calf and the other  a black calf.
And then there is the whole tenderness thing and that is another selling point for some of the "colored breeds" but if you market cattle in this area, it's got to be black regardless of anything else....
All that said, there are those who also believe we are losing some of the vigor in some of the breeds by only using polled animals;  ie:  herefords.  We are narrowing the available gene pool by restricting some of the available genetics by only using polled animals.  Most Horned herefords that I have seen are more massive than the polled ones.  And alot of people don't realize that charolais also had more horned animals,  and they weren't all white but also a tan/creamy/red color.
Horned cattle are more popular on ranches where there is more land/acres PER cow rather than more cows per acre/land.


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## NH homesteader (Dec 24, 2016)

I am not a cattle person but this is very interesting.  It's amazing (and awful)  what we do to entire breeds of animals as a side effect of one thing we are trying to make easier or safer for ourselves.


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## farmerjan (Dec 24, 2016)

It's called genetic man-made manipulation....not natural selection....
And it is the same for all the people who "feel sorry" for an animal that has problems, born premie, birth defects, you name it and then they try to save/fix it.  Then they go and breed that animal because it is "sweet" or "cute" or something.  Only to perpetuate a genetic deformity that nature would have/does rule out by letting that animal die and not allowing the genes into the general breeding pool.  I am not saying that things like inbreeding and other defects don't occur in nature, but as humans we interfere ALOT.


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## greybeard (Dec 24, 2016)

Yes, we interfere a lot, but if we had not, beef breeds like Hereford would still be huge frame animals. One of the reasons we see so many horned herefords that are a larger frame, is that there are fewer of them nowadys and those breeders are behind the curve somewhat in breeding down to a smaller frame animal.

You mentioned that we may be losing some hybrid vigor in general in our beef breeds, and I agree. That is because I think we have moved too far in selecting only British genetics and leaving out continental genetics--charolais, simmental, shorthorn etc.


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## farmerjan (Dec 24, 2016)

O


greybeard said:


> Yes, we interfere a lot, but if we had not, beef breeds like Hereford would still be huge frame animals. One of the reasons we see so many horned herefords that are a larger frame, is that there are fewer of them nowadys and those breeders are behind the curve somewhat in breeding down to a smaller frame animal.
> 
> You mentioned that we may be losing some hybrid vigor in general in our beef breeds, and I agree. That is because I think we have moved too far in selecting only British genetics and leaving out continental genetics--charolais, simmental, shorthorn etc.



Original herefords were not so massive framed....they were short, stocky, cattle like the original angus.  They were originally bred to put on pounds on short legs.  The after they were imported here we had to have "bigger, taller" cattle.  Do you remember back in the 80's and 90's when the angus were huge and they were as tall as Chianina's?  I was doing some breeding for Select sires then and could not believe the size of some of the show/purebred angus. 
I meant more that the horned herefords seem to have more body mass than the polled ones.  I hadn't seen alot more leg but they were just so much more  "hunks" than the polled ones I see.  But there are no horned herefords around here that I know of.  Shorthorns are also in short supply and I honestly haven't seen any that impress me.  Used to be that you thought a shorthorn influence would make a good cow because she would milk better...but when they separated the milking and the "beef" shorthorns, they really lost something.  Have had a dozen over the years and didn't keep any past the 3rd calf.  Not saying there aren't good ones, just haven't had any luck with them myself.  Simmental take longer to mature,  and the calves are discounted;  I used to like the various colors but now they are mostly black....Used to have a dozen or so of them too but have bred them down with the angus...I'm actually looking at some of the double muscled breeds to add muscle to the calves...want to try a little bit of AI experimenting.  I like shorter legged cattle but here if they are too short it will kill them at the sale too...


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