1) My curiosity is getting the best of me! Is it SO hard to disbud and not have scurs later? I see all these pics of goats with NO scurs. And hear all the advice about disbudding. Yet I have goats from 3 different farms with scurs. WHY...? This is what worries me about disbudding them. I just can't stand the thought of my leaving anything there to grow later. Didn't I see where someone said there was a video of Deb doing her figure 8 at one time? I want all tips on no scurs before I have to disbud. Even though I don't want to do it at all, I have decided that I am going to practice by doing the ones we have born that I plan to eat just so I can see how well they turn out.
2) Anything I can do about the ones I have that won't be to drastic at this point. The oldest and biggest is on a 16 month old buck who weighs about 50 or 60 lbs. Probably nothing I can do now huh? The others are younger and smaller ( varied ages and sizes )
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Well, if you start off with a new iron, it will be quite thin in a few years without you having to bevel it! :) I would hate for someone new to grind down a disbudding iron and then realize they didn't like doing it his way. Those things are expensive! Our old disbudding iron has been really thin this year, and we've had the worst scurs ever. We've even had them on does, which is very frustrating because we've never had them before. But at least they are very small and will likely stay very small (like the size of a kidney bean) on the does.
I appreciate your comments Debbie, and I'm glad you contacted him. Maybe if I understood this man's methods better, I'd be willing to do it like he does. No one likes scurs! But I also don't want to accidentally kill a kid disbudding.
Now I'm totally flummoxed! LOL!
Very good points made Deborah. I'm not even sure if what I see on my kids are scurs anyway, being so new at this. His method may be good too, but being a newbie, how am I to know for sure? There seems to be no long term conclusions, or pictures on the net or info from long time breeders of Nigerians in particular to show me with either of these methods and their outcomes after a Nigerian kid gets older (or I just can't find them....lol)
I do realize of course the disbudding outcome may vary from goat to goat too. I would like to see some studies/pictures from vets or Universities that know goats and their conclusions on this disbudding issue.
I did contact this gentleman about his iron and he was very informative and willing to answering my questions about the thickness of that iron after it's beveled at the 45 degree angle. A new iron tip is about 1/8", after grinding it's about 1/16" So that explains why it cuts so quickly. I've not taken the time to ask him further questions about his method, and may do so later. In our correspondence via email he is very aware of the thinness of a kids skull and suggests not to reburn till 8 to 9 weeks after the first initial disbudding. He is in Indiana and raises purebred Nigerians and is active in the show circuit there.
I will probably decide to hold on the side of caution, burning to the skull really scares me, and like you said Deb most have burned to the copper ring forever with a good outcome. My intention was not to stir up things, just to learn, observe and listen to others methods and then make a decision with the least amount of stress created for our goats. Thank-you :)
I have been trying to make sense of those videos, and we just disbudded some kids today, so here is what I'm thinking. I had not watched the tools video originally because I assumed I knew what I needed. I'm glad someone mentioned him beveling the tip of the disbudding iron. I went back and watched that one. It is interesting because I have been meaning to post a message about this -- our original disbudding iron is 8 years old now and has been used to disbud 300+ kids, and we recently realized that the tip is super thin! In fact, in January, we cut through "something" that completely freaked us out, and we stopped, and I called U of I because we thought we had cut through the skull, even though the kid seemed totally fine. The vet said that we had burned through the protective covering on the skull and the kid would probably be fine. She was right. We were still worried about infection though because it looked very white and wet where we had burned through, so we were not able to cauterize like we usually do. The doe turned out to be totally OK though and is four months old now.
The second thing about that really thin disbudding iron is that we got scurs on doelings this year, which has never happened before! We did not realize there was a problem with the iron until a month ago when our daughter was visiting and was holding kids for my husband to disbud, and she saw the iron and told me that we needed to get a new one because she was afraid that her dad was going to cut through the kid's skull. That's when everything clicked! I looked at the iron and realized how thin the metal had become from all those disbuddings. So, we ordered a new iron even though our current one was still heating up just fine. We felt that the old iron was dangerous and not doing a good job.
So, it seems that this man is suggesting that you not only go through the skin, but you also go through the protective covering on the skull, which scares me, especially telling someone to do that when they are completely new to disbudding. I've mentioned it on here before, but years ago, a week before we were going to do our first disbudding, someone on another group went through a kid's skull, and the vets at U of I have told me that that is possible with goat kids because they do have a pretty thin skull compared to calves. (They said there is no way you could burn through a calf's skull.)
I really don't see the point of disbudding like this with does because they don't get scurs if you do it correctly using the copper-ring suggestion that everyone has been talking about forever.
When disbudding the kids today, I was also paying really close attention to how everything looked. The ring looked white before it looked copper, and I'm not sure you could flick off the cap at that point, but if you're using a knife like this man, then you could get it off. But anyway, we burn until we see a copper ring. When you pop off the skin cap at that point, which you can do with a fingernail or the tip of the disbudding iron, the horn bud underneath looks white, and we then burn it until it looks copper also. But the man in the video doesn't burn the cap at all. I could see that someone who had never disbudded a goat might completely botch the job. Not cauterizing that big open wound also scares me because it's wet, and hay and dirt and everything could fall in there and stick.
Apparently whatever he is doing is working for him. Perhaps he just didn't do a good job of explaining it fully?
I did not specify why I suggested the sight mostly because I could not hold my eyes open but also because I wanted someones reaction to what I had read. You caught it too! I too, was very intrigued about the horn growth issues of NDs and the mixes vs. larger breeds. Very interesting ah? And it kind of makes some since of the issues at hand and the possible need for non-traditional methods. I should have 2 does kid before July so I will get an idea. 1 will be reg. nigis.
Disbudding, scurs, how to, different methods, all kinds of info on the net, various videos.........it can drive us newbies nuts....lol! We have a vet too that owns goats and disbuds and he still gets scurs!
I wish there was follow up videos or pictures to this method this gentleman uses. I would also like to see pictures and follow ups on burning to the copper ring only verses burning to the white on just Nigerians.
The article that Margret mentioned is probably one of the clearest written I have read on the net on how to disbud. I find it very interesting that she indicates Nigerians are the hardest to disbud and have the most presistant horn growth, because of a wider horn base. She also indicates the next hardest goats to burn are the mini mix breeds. Go figure, I have both!! Take note, someone here mentioned of fiasco farm's pictures on disbudding, she has full size goats, not minis, so there must be something to that, because the author also indicated in the article, full size goats are easier to disbud.
I'm really seeing now with my own herd and doing it for the first time this year and burning to the copper ring, burning to the white tissue ring may be the better way of going. I'm thinking once you get down to that tissue the horn bud is popped off so no need to burn it down. The gentleman's method uses his knife to pop them off verses others who I have seen using the iron that has had its tip ground to a 45 degree angle and popping them off.
The goat mentor of mine that recently visited a well know breeder in Maine and watched her uses this method, burns to a white ring using a redefined iron tip, I believe is Old Mountain Farm. I think she may be a member here. Would love to hear from her with her input.
Keep us posted Margret with your outcome on your kids if you try this method. Thank-you
Look up "glimmercroft disbudding" ( sorry don't know how to give you a link ) I read some VERY INTERESTING things I have NOT SEEN BEFORE that I believe you would be interested in studying.
I'd just like to see photos of older goats that he has disbudded using the technique he shares in the videos. Be careful what/how you share from his site. His copyright wording is pretty restrictive. I was wishing he had the images on his site so we could just look at them there.
Hum, we might can get those pics you want I'll have to try something. Tell me the pics you would want are of things in the videos or not? And do you just want them for you or the site or what? I have an idea!
I'll be interested to see what happens for sure!! It would be nice if the man who runs that site had photos. He's not of a "like mind" it seems on other herd management issues... otherwise, I'd probably email and ask for some.
Exactly. Well, we will just have to do our own comparison study! Now I am not feeling as bad about having to do it since I can look at it as a perfecting a method experience. ya!
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