There’s a lot of people that will raise goats and keep horns on older goats and then usually there’s very little problem s far as fighting. Usually what happens is when you introduce an animal with horns into a group of animals with no horns then suddenly that animal has complete seniority. You know and then you worry about injuries from horns to other animals. I mean that definitely is a problem. If you have a herd of goats without horns, I don’t recommend introducing a goat with horns and vice-versa, especially if you have just one or two goats I think. But it’s going to depend also between those goats. The social interaction between goats is going to depend. I’ve seen situations where some animals had horns and some didn’t and there was never any problems with fighting, so it’s just depend from one to the next. I think if you are going to purchase a pygmy goat, I think it’s important that when you do get your pygmy goat that if you’ve decided that you don’t want horns to buy from a breeder that dehorns early and that the horns have been removed before you purchase the animal because after about…You know as soon as those horn buds start to develop they need to be removed quite promptly because they actually have a very good blood supply and can grow quite prolifically and even if you decide to dehorn later in life, the chance of recurrence, of them regrowing, is very high.

Tammy I see. Okay.

Dr. Hradic: And adult removal of horns or removing horns after the horns have been completely grown in is a pretty traumatic experience on the animal. A lot of care and time goes into nursing that animal after they’ve had a procedure like that.
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