Dehorning and disbudding of cattle are among the most common painful husbandry procedures, with evidence-based standards for pain management and alternatives to physical procedures.
Dehorning without pain relief is now widely recognised as causing unnecessary suffering that is avoidable through either proper anaesthesia and analgesia or transition to polled genetics. The pain of dehorning without pain management is acute and prolonged, affecting feeding behaviour and growth for days after the procedure. Pre-emptive local anaesthesia and post-procedural NSAIDs together significantly reduce welfare harm. However, the long-term solution is genetic selection for naturally polled animals, which eliminates the welfare cost entirely. Producer resistance to this solution reflects attachment to traditional breeding lines rather than fundamental incompatibility.