Nesikep":2d2lyrc9 said:
I'd say you'd have to be more wary of tetanus by cutting rather than banding.. sounds more logical to me that if you have an open wound you'd open to door to infection more than a rubber band.
I've got my reservations about advice from vets... I had an adult cow dehorned once, and the vet said I didn't need to do anything to the wound (this was done in Feb.)... well, come may, she got flies laying eggs in there, and I had a nightmare for 2 months to get her cleaned up, and with all that stress, she didn't rebreed... so I lost a perfectly good cow to his advice... Of course once there's a problem, he'd tell me to give tetracycline, etc and err on the side of caution every time, but I got her fixed back up with a lot of iodine, alcohol, and bandages smeared with pine pitch and beeswax... once the wounds were clean, she healed up really fast and it was surprising
When you dehorn, especially older animals, you need to pack the sinus with pine tar to keep the flies out.
If it does become infected/infested (because you left it open) dump a bottle of hydrogen peroxide in the sinus. Clear it right up. :cowboy:
No worries about tetanus with cutting. Cut is clean and it drains instead of festering. The only worry is blood loss (which is always at the back of my mind). I had real good luck with cutting up till last fall. I cut my fall calves with my usual Newberry knife and crushed/cut the cords with an emasculator. Well, next morning, I woke up to two dead calves (I felt sick) :frowns: . They had been bleeding a bit after the procedure, but nothing too major. It was a cold November night (froze) and I think they kept getting up and down all night which, as tytower mentioned, can open the wound up. Also, aggressive licking by the calf and cow will keep the blood flowing.
I always liked cutting because it has a fraction of the recovery time that banding has. Banded calves will spend 2 weeks continually getting up and lying down because they are so uncomfortable. Cut calves will be back to normal within a couple days.
I am a little gun shy about cutting now and will go back to banding, opting for the XL bands, as the green 'cheerios' break way to often and I have ended up in the past with sick calves where the band only lasted 1/2 as long as it should, breaks, and the calf ends up walking around with a 1/2 rotten piece of flesh dangling.