Loading ...On the ranch I had 250++ cows that were everything from purebred Simmental…. to Red Angus…..to Dual Purpose Shorthorn…. to crosses of all those. When a calf was born there was an even chance that it would have enough horned genetics that I would have to dehorn it, and the sooner that was done after birth the easier it was on the calf. Conventional dehorning methods were very chancy because depending on the calf’s age, size of the horns or hornbuds, and method used to dehorn it, it could be very painful and traumatic for the calf. The three methods in practice were #1 “the gouge”, which created a large wound in order to remove the horn base and caused lots of bleeding; #2 the hot iron which burned out the horn base and again created a large painful wound and much trauma for the calf, and #3 Dehorning paste; the choice I used which was to put some caustic paste on each horn bud which seemed to work best unless it was raining or unless the calf rubbed its head against its mother while sucking. Then there were burns that sometimes got into the calves eyes and created other issues. Anyway, this was a very unpleasant part of the cattle business….. until a new invention came along called the Buddex Cordless Dehorner. It was expensive but only burned a tiny ring around the horn bud which killed the nerves and blood supply to the horns….and the horn bud fell off on its own over the next few weeks. So I bought one and had no more dehorning issues after that until my Buddex Dehorner quit working. So naturally I took it apart and found and fixed the problem, called the manufacturer’s rep in the USA to explain what I had done, got chewed out and told I had voided my warrantee by opening up the unit and fixing it myself, but we talked for awhile, getting to know each other….and a week later I got a call from him again, asking if I was interested in becoming the Canadian Distributor and Warranty service for their company. They had been trying to handle it from the USA and had been largely unsuccessful in Canada due to border issues. They had only sold about 100 dehorners in Canada over the past year but had sold 1000+ in the USA. So the upshot was that I became their exclusive Canadian Distributor and Warranty Service, I advertised in the farm papers across Canada, sold 1500+ of them in the next 60 days, repaired a few, and had added a lucrative sideline business to my remote ranch. One thing I have learned over the years is that initiative normally pays.
Sometimes it pays to “bend” the rules!