# Scur removal



## goingnutsmom (Nov 28, 2009)

Logan my 1 1/2 year old wether has some nasty scurs. They are like horns coming up from the front of where he was disbudded. They are wiggly but strong. I have been jabbed in the jaw by one (my fault) and thought I had broken my jaw, and my 17 year old daughter has been whacked above her eye. I am worried that an eye will be next. He uses them like horns and tries to toss the does over his head. Two days ago he got his head stuck in the hog panel fence and we spent an hour getting him out. I had a friend come over with horse hoof nippers and we trimmed it way back. I usually keep them down when they get about 3 inches high. I was told by my vet that if they are wiggly, she wouldn't have to cut into his skull for removal, but when she looked at him at our fair, she said it was going to be a nasty business to take them out and he would have a HUGE unicorn hole in his head for a long time. Now I don't know what to do. Should I try banding them first? Will they grow back? Should I go ahead and have them surgically removed after fly season is over? I will take some photos and try attaching them in a few minutes.
[attachment=1:2it7r9wx]DSCN0930.JPG[/attachment:2it7r9wx]
[attachment=0:2it7r9wx]DSCN0928.JPG[/attachment:2it7r9wx]
From my understanding what the vet is saying, she is going to take the scurs out and what I would call his forehead lump. To me it seems like to much. His scurs have grown from the area that would be the ridge in from of his horn buds. Hope this makes sence.


----------



## AACmama (Jul 29, 2010)

Debbie,
One of our wethers also has some nasty scurs that we had to deal with. One was trying to curl back into his head. He had been disbudded twice, as well has "dehorned" by the vet at 2 months of age. Now, at 4 months, they are gnarly and curled...not good. Our boys cannot have horns due to a number of reasons but we also cannot put them through dehorning every 2 months!

Saturday (3 days ago) we put castrating bands on our little guy as low to the skull as we could. The misshapen curls made it tough, both to trim away the hair so it wouldn't pull and to get the bands all the way down to the horn base. He has been pretty uncomfortable since, making us second-guess the wisdom of this procedure. We wonder if the scraggly corners of the scurs make the pressure uneven. He still bawls pathetically and his head is quite sensitive. Your pictures show a much smoother, rounder horn base and I'm curious to hear how your wether tolerates banding if you choose to go that route. A lady on one of the goat listservs I'm on has switched over completely to banding as her method for"horn patrol" and reports no discomfort with her goats. Wish I could say the same!

Keep us posted,
Rose-Marie


----------



## sweetgoatmama (Dec 10, 2008)

THese are what I call fingernails scurs. THey don't have a blood supply and can easily be removed by using a pair of bolt cutters and a file. They will come back but then you can keep up with them by filling. As he gets older the growth will slow way down. If you do this make a few cuts as you go down and if you hit any oozing stop. The blood supply will be minimal and will die back just like if you clip your fingernails really short all the time.
You will have to have him restrained in a milk stand. What the vet wants to do will solve the problem but his head will hurt bad for the several weeks it takes to heal.

I really don't recommend banding because of the ongoing pain it causes.


----------



## Cazz (Jun 9, 2010)

I would suggest rings - if he's not a sook, as it doesn't sound like he is from his actions, then he will be fine. Scurs have no need to be painful unless the goat is one that marrs at anything anyway, brush/clip back the hair, file a dint if needed, and put min. two rings in. Replace rings as neccesary, as they can rub them out. Good luck. 
Cazz


----------



## goingnutsmom (Nov 28, 2009)

Sorry I haven't been back in in awhile. Well, actually I have been on the forum, but I never could remember where I put my posts at. Today I found a place in the user control panel that lets me see what ever I have posted! Guess I should check things out better!;
Anyway, Rose-Marie, how did your banding session go with your guy?
I still haven't done Logan, the angle of his scur growth as changed and they are not growing into his head any more and we have been able to trim them off better now.

I have heard good things and band things about banding from lots of pain to horns popping off when not ready and bleeding real bad.
Thanks everyone


----------



## AACmama (Jul 29, 2010)

Thanks for checking on the banding, Debbie. I think we didn't get the bands down far enough onto the head. Only one horn fell off out of two banded, and it has grown right back. The other looks to have a weakened "line," for lack of a better word, where the band was placed. But it didn't ever fall off and is now a rather unattractive curl.

The banding HURT our little guy. He hollered and shook his head for about two weeks, despite the baby aspirin. This lasted longer than I was expecting. The whole experience left him very sensory defensive when it comes to his head and he is very skittish about us touching it now. In fact, I personally won't try it again unless I have a seasoned mentor walking through it with me.

Wish I had a happier report. It sounds like other folks have had better luck than us. I would love for it to have worked, because he was much too old when his breeder tried to disbud him. Scurs are probably a part of his life and we'd love to control the scurs without a full dehorning (especially since the vet's first go at that ended up in these scurs that we had to band).

Good luck, and please let us know how it goes for you!
Rose-Marie


----------



## jross (Dec 20, 2008)

Been there, done that. I've had big problems with scurs on my boys since the beginning. Two have loose scurs and one has really solid ones growing out of his skull. I tried the banding method. It was very painful for the goats and a complete failure. It failed because I didn't get the bands low enough on the head. Even if I had it still would have hurt them very badly. But if done right it probably would have been successful. Cazz sounds like he knows what he's doing. Had I done it his way it probably would have worked. I'm not going to do it again, tho.

But after several trips to the vet, who just anethsesized the goats, sawed the scurs off very close to the head and cauterized it to stop the bleeding they seem to be pretty much under control. They still have small scurs but they seem to knock them off, butting heads with each other. Maybe now that they are almost 5 yrs old the scurs have stopped growing so much. Another vet says he can totally remove the scurs on the goats with the loose scurs and sew the skin shut and that will be the end of it. If they come back and cause problems again that's what I'm going for next. 

What an ordeal it has been.


----------



## Cazz (Jun 9, 2010)

Oh dear, your goats sound quite sensitive.  We have had great success with it, our goats have never marred more than a few hours, and normally only if they are sooks anyway. We just file in a bit if needed, stick the rings in and keep an eye on them. The rings work on scurs too, and with scurs our goats haven't the slightest worry and don't marr. Here is a little story of one of my does, Megs.
We ringed her horns but not low enough 1.5 years ago. She is a real scaredy girl (or used to be - not since she lost her horns) and had a fit when she got tattooed as well - worst I have ever heard, so her being upset about rings on her horns wasn't much of a worry.
She lost her first horn prematurely, because she was trying not to let me trim her beard. (she hated it being cut, although is just annoyed at it now, and I don't like any except one of our does to have beards)
Anyway, she was jumping around like mad (as she was a bit mad at that time) and hit her head really hard on the wall. One horn came off, and although there was quite a bit of blood, it stopped in about five minutes and started drying out. I put her on the milking stand, fed her and sprayed on disinfectant, and that was that.
About a month later (four-five months from her original ringing) her second horn came off while she was in the goat yard, I came down to milking and couldn't recognize her! It came off when it was meant to and I couldn't even notice any blood without looking closely. :shock:  
She grew scurs, very large on each side. We put rings on them and she didn't mind at all, in fact the disgusting teasing she did trying to convince her aunt Midgee that Midgee should be a buck when Megs was in heat, I felt like hitting her head with a hammer to make her notice some pain and give her something else to think about!
Both of the scurs have come off, neither with any blood or pain, and her head is nearly flat now. She has turned from a head-shy,dangerously horned girl into a real smooch, lovesto rub her head on me or try to sniff my face, and doesn't mind her head being touched really much at all.
If the scurs are loose or small, you can get a type of ragged wire that, sawed back and forth, will cut off the scur. If it is done really fast it almost cauterises the head too. We had it done on a buck who we hadn't got around to ringing his scurs early enough (in fact, he is the brother of Megs) and for scurs that the rings had weakened and stopped the blood supply, it worked totally well with no blood. For scurs without rings there was a bit of blood, but not much. You could even try both, ringing and then sawing, if you wanted. 
Some people when banding put in a shot of loacal anesthetic around the base of the horn, doens't hurt them at all that way and they actually cut into the skin around the base of the horn and put the rings in there - no chance of growng back, and very effective, also no worry of pain or some horn staying in the head.
This is another doe one day after her horn came off.
[attachment=1:zcb3x6w4]102_0305-Jint-25%+crop+rotate.JPG[/attachment:zcb3x6w4]
This is her more than six months after her second horn came off, no scurs at all, and she is very happy and her owners are very happy with her too. She got a lot tamer after she lost her horns as well.
We have had wethers with scurs, but only small ones, and the rings worked on them too.

Cheers,
Cazz

By the way, thanks jross - I think you're the first person to address me as 'him'. :lol:


----------



## AACmama (Jul 29, 2010)

Cazz, I sure wish we had the same kind of luck from banding as you did! For the bloodlessness, simplicity, and price, it sounds like it could really be agreat answer.

Unfortunately, our banding story went from bad (the pain) to "scurs" that grew back after. The poor boy now has "horns" are more like actual, heavy horn. While they do have blunt tips, they are pointing inwards towards his skull and will need to be sawed off soon. I don't think we'd band him again if we could, but the way his horns press against each other, I can't even get a fingernail between them, let alone a castrator band. That's 5 horn procedures for this boy in 18 months...too many unpleasant procedures all because his original disbuddings (two) were done incorrectly. I'm afraid it just didn't touch the horn stem cells.

Do I take from what you have shared that if we band far enough down on the horn, it will get even those horn-growing cells?

What we have taken from this experience is to buy our boys disbudded not later than7 days of age (does may be different; just talking males here). The two wethers we have who had good early disbuddings have no signs of horn growth at all at 7 months. From now on, we will ask their breeders at what day they were disbudded, and if it is anything higher than 7, we will thank them for their time and leave. 

Once burned (actually twice, once dehorned, once banded...soon-to-be sawed?), twice shy,
Rose-Marie


----------



## Cazz (Jun 9, 2010)

That's really bad Rose-Marie! :? We have had scurs that were too large/close together sawed off with embryoctonic wire, it is very fine and sharp and I think it is used to cut up baby animals when they are inside their mums and stuck. (sorry for any horrible pictures being conjured up here! :? )
It worked pretty well as well, only a tiny bit/no blood from the scurs that had been rung and the goats didn't really notice. With the banding, if the entire horns comes off then the cells appear to have been removed, but if the horn snaps off, then there is still a base to grow scurs from. I have heard that 'disbudding' after removing the horns in whatever manner will both cauterise the wound and stop the blood flow, while killing any remaining horn cells.

With disbudding, all kids should be disbudded at a week or younger, though there are occasional exceptions with tiny horn buds who are fine to wait up to two weeks - three weeks at the utter maximum. We have disbudded several wethers at two weeks who we bought from a goat dairy and had very small horn buds compared to kids born here. It really pays though to be 'cruel to be kind' when disbudding, because as you have noticed, properly done when they are little means a goat without scurs and worries, while feeling sorry and only doing a half job means a lot of work, pain and worry later on.

I really hope everything resolves soon for you and your poor boy!  
Cazz


----------

