Dehorning causes significant pain in cattle and is performed on millions of animals annually. Evidence-based pain management can dramatically reduce suffering during this common procedure.
Dehorning without pain management causes both acute and prolonged pain. The hot-iron disbudding procedure triggers immediate pain responses, elevated cortisol, reduced feed intake and abnormal behaviour for 24-72 hours. Older cattle dehorned with saws or guillotines experience even more severe and prolonged pain. The evidence for effective pain management is robust: local anaesthetic blocks acute procedural pain; NSAIDs reduce post-procedural inflammation for 24-48 hours; sedation improves the procedure for both animal and operator. Despite this evidence, pain management for dehorning remains inconsistently used due to cost, regulatory barriers to veterinary drug administration and lack of mandatory requirements. The most welfare-positive solution — breeding polled genetics into dairy cattle — is advancing but requires industry-wide commitment.