One of the 3 veterinarians at the Te Aroha branch of the Animal Health Centre, Dr. Amy King (who hails from Canada and graduated from veterinary school on Prince Edward Island) has been assigned to perform all the calf dehornings (called disbudding in NZ). Jess & I have been taking turns going with Amy on disbudding calls. It’s strange for us Americans, to see ALL the calves within the same age range. This is a pic of the calves before we start.

Here are the wee-little-ones sleeping – drugs are a wonderful thing. In NZ, the disbudding protocol involves sedation and a local anesthetic blocks – it makes the work quite easy. The downside is that at each call we do between 30-80 calves.