At 60 d, calves were fully weaned from milk. Weaning began at 50 d in a stepdown manner, with calves receiving milk 1×/d and added ad libitum access to TMR. Milk was fed via a bucket from this time through weaning. From 0 to 5 d calves received colostrum, then rehydrated milk replacer (26% CP, 16% fat, 15% total solids, mixed as indicated at a rate of 142 g/L of hot water Calva Products Inc.) via a bottle until 35 to 38 d of age. Milk provision increased by 0.5 L per feeding at 8, 18, and 32 d of age. Jerseys and Holsteins were fed 1.4 and 1.9 L of milk, respectively, twice daily (09 h). From birth, access to grain (Starter Calf Feed 901033, Associated Feed and Supply Co.) and water was available ad libitum. Key wordsĬalves were fed according to the farm's standard operating procedure. Future work should examine whether aspects of paste application (e.g., amount used, time rubbed in, calf age, pain mitigation) could improve healing time and sensitivity. In conclusion, caustic paste disbudding wounds took 18.8 wk to fully heal and were more sensitive than intact horn buds for 6 wk. These data indicate that wounds from caustic paste disbudding are more sensitive than undamaged tissue for at least 6 wk and take twice as long to heal compared with cautery methods described in the literature. Compared with non-disbudded controls, paste calves exhibited lower MNT values for all 6 wk (mean ± SE control: 1.46 ± 0.16 paste: 1.18 ± 0.12 N). Wounds were slow to re-epithelialize (16.2 ± 5.7 wk, mean ± SD range: 6.2–32.5 wk) and contract to be considered fully healed (18.8 ± 6 wk, mean ± SD range: 8.7–34.1 wk). Mechanical nociceptive threshold (MNT) measures were collected weekly to evaluate wound sensitivity until calves were removed from the study or healed. Control calves were removed from the experiment after 6 wk to be hot-iron disbudded. Following disbudding, wounds were scored 2×/wk for the presence or absence of 8 tissue categories, including the final stages: new epithelium and fully healed. Calves ≥34 kg and <34 kg at birth had 0.3 or 0.25 mL of paste applied per unshaved horn bud, respectively. Before disbudding, calves received a local block and a nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drug. Naylor Company Inc.) at 3 d of age (n = 18), and control calves received a sham procedure (n = 15). Jersey and Holstein female calves were disbudded using caustic paste (H. Our objective was to describe wound healing and sensitivity following caustic paste disbudding. In contrast, researchers have reported it takes 7 to 9 wk, on average, for hot-iron disbudding wounds to re-epithelialize in dairy calves. Caustic paste disbudding is increasing in popularity on commercial dairy farms in the United States, but little research has explored the pain and welfare implications beyond the acute period of this procedure.
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