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The Veterinary Journal 173 (2007) 245–247

TheVeterinary Journal

Guest Editorial

Alleviating the pain caused by the castration of cattle

The castration of bulls to produce draft oxen, makingcattle safer and easier to manage, preventing unwantedmating and modifying carcass characteristics, is an an-cient practice. All physical methods of castration causepain and veterinary interest in alleviating this pain isnot new. In 1929, Campbell recommended that the sec-ond crush of the Burdizzo be distal to the first so as toreduce pain and in 1935 Miller wrote to justify castra-tion to the �humanitarian� in the second edition ofBlack�s Veterinary Dictionary.

Individual veterinarians dislike particular methods ofcastration. Cox (1977) and Clarke-Lewis (1977) recom-mended that the Burdizzo be banned because of the painit caused (the latter likened it to a gin trap), and Weaver(1986), in his excellent textbook on bovine surgery, con-demned rubber ring castration because of the post-oper-ative pain it caused. However, most non-clinicalattempts at quantifying the pain caused by castrationin calves, using physiological and immunological re-sponses and behaviour, were carried out in the last 20years (Stafford and Mellor, 2005). In these studies localanaesthesia and/or systemic analgesia were used to iden-tify the physiological responses and behaviours causedby the pain of castration. The pain caused by differentmethods of castration was compared and methods ofalleviating this pain investigated (Stafford et al., 2002).

The paper by Susann Thuer and colleagues publishedin this issue of The Veterinary Journal continues thismode of research (Thuer et al., 2007). They comparedthe behaviour and plasma cortisol responses to twomethods of castration (rubber ring and Burdizzo) withand without local anaesthesia. They found that the plas-ma cortisol response to Burdizzo castration was greaterinitially than the response to rubber ring castration butthe response lasted longer after the latter technique hadbeen used. These results suggest that the pain experi-enced during and for the first hour or so after Burdizzocastration is greater than that caused by rubber ring cas-tration but that the ring technique probably causes

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greater pain for the next few hours. The plasma cortisolresponse to ring and surgical castration are similar (Staf-ford et al., 2002). The overall pain caused by Burdizzo inthe hours following castration, as defined by the inte-grated plasma cortisol, is less than that caused by sur-gery or ring castration (Molony et al., 1995; Staffordet al., 2002).

Thuer and colleagues also found that calves whichhad been castrated by rubber ring responded to scrotalpalpation in a manner suggestive of pain for eight weekswhile those castrated by Burdizzo stopped respondingafter two weeks (Thuer et al., 2007). They concludedthat the Burdizzo method was preferable to the rubberring because of the long term pain experienced by calvescastrated using rings. This conclusion is supported bythe observations of Molony et al. (1995) who found thatbehaviour returned to normal following surgical, Bur-dizzo and rubber ring castration after 9, 15 and 45 days,respectively.

Thuer et al. (2007) found that local anaesthesia giveninto the spermatic cord and scrotal neck reduced thepain related behaviours during Burdizzo castration.However local anaesthesia given into the testes and scro-tum does not reduce the plasma cortisol response toBurdizzo or surgical castration but eliminates that fol-lowing ring castration (Stafford et al., 2002). To elimi-nate the plasma cortisol response, and by inference thepain experienced, in the 8 h following surgical or Bur-dizzo castration, it is necessary to use local anaesthetic,given into the scrotum or its contents, combined with asystemic analgesic such as a non-steroidal anti-inflam-matory drug (NSAID) (Stafford et al., 2002). The epidu-ral administration of xylazine acts as an effectiveanalgesic for about 80% of adult bulls (Caulkett et al.,1993).

Pain is not the only issue to be considered whenchoosing a method of castration. Side-effects (infection,haemorrhage), wound healing, the ease of carrying outthe procedure, cost and access to local anaesthetics

246 Guest Editorial / The Veterinary Journal 173 (2007) 245–247

and analgesics, and the availability of equipment andtrained staff are important. Certainty of castration is apriority and failure rates are higher with Burdizzo cas-tration than with ring or surgery (Kent et al., 1996).Failure will result in some cattle having to be castrateda second time and may cause unwanted mating, oftenof immature heifers, with all the welfare problems boththese issues involve. Beef production from bulls is possi-ble but there are welfare issues with bull beef production– notably injuries, which may be serious, from fightingand riding. Alternative methods of castration such aschemical or immuno-castration are not useful at thistime.

So what castration protocol can one recommend? Thedecision depends upon what is practicable, what level ofanalgesia is possible and how one interprets the signifi-cance of acute versus longer term pain for the calf. Cattlemanagement practices may determine the age at castra-tion. Robertson et al. (1994) showed that younger calvesexperience less pain than older animals, but it may not bepossible to castrate young calves on extensive beef prop-erties where calves may not be mustered until they are fiveor six months of age when they are castrated, vaccinated,marked (branded, ear tagged, ear notched) and treatedfor parasites. Rubber rings are too small for calves thisage, Burdizzo castration is too slow, and generally thesecalves are castrated surgically without analgesia. Re-cently a castration device using a latex ring band has beendeveloped to castrate large cattle. However, this methodcauses greater reduction in weight gain than surgical cas-tration in the months following castration (Knight et al.,2000) suggesting that it is the more painful procedure. Onintensive cattle farms calves are frequently handled froman early age and can be castrated in the first days or weeksof life by whatever method.

The cost of analgesic drugs and legal restrictions onwho can use veterinary drugs may make pain controldifficult for many farmers, and the cost of employing aveterinarian to carry out a basic husbandry practiceslike castration may be prohibitive (Stafford et al.,2005). In any case farm animal veterinarians are rarein many communities. Therefore in many parts of theworld and in many production systems, pain alleviationfor cattle subject to castration is unlikely to happen inthe near future. It is nevertheless important that wealthycountries do not use this lack of opportunity to hampertrade thus using animal welfare as a form of cultural andeconomic imperialism.

Surgical castration of calves, the method favoured bymany veterinarians, has advantages with regard to longterm pain but local anaesthesia plus a systemic analge-sic, or epidural anaesthesia is needed to alleviate thepain it causes in the 8 h immediately following the cas-tration. Surgery causes more pain in this period thanBurdizzo but the certainty and simplicity of the proce-dure has much to recommend it. Rubber ring castration

is simple, cheap and effective on young calves and thepain caused by it in the following 8 h can be alleviatedby local anaesthesia given into the testes and scrotum,but the long term pain it causes is an important issue.

Indeed understanding the significance of long termpain is the most important topic for those investigatingthe pain caused by surgery in all animals. It may be thatafter some hours or days, castrated calves experience irri-tation rather than pain. If, however, calves continue toexperience pain over the weeks following castration itis important to determine how severe is this pain andwhether it differs with the various methods of castration.If it is shown that the pain is significant we will need todevelop protocols to prevent this pain or to alleviate iton an ongoing basis for some weeks after castration.At present this is neither practicable nor economicallypossible. Thus while we can gauge the relative severityof the pain caused by different methods of castration inthe hours following castration and know how to lessenit, there remains a number of important questions relat-ing to our understanding of the experience of the longlasting pain caused by castration and its alleviation.

Kevin StaffordAnimal Welfare Science and Bioethics Centre,

Institute of Veterinary Animal and Bioethics Centre,

Massey University, Palmerston North, New Zealand

E-mail address: K.J.Stafford@massey.ac.nz

References

Campbell, W.A., 1929. Castration by the Burdizzo. The VeterinaryRecord 9, 81.

Caulkett, N.A., MacDonald, D.G., Janzen, E.D., Cribb, P.N.,Fretz, P.B., 1993. Xylazine hydrochloride epidural analgesia – amethod of providing sedation and analgesia to facilitatecastration of mature bulls. Compendium of Continuing Educa-tion for Practicing Veterinarians 15, 1155–1159.

Clarke-Lewis, A.V., 1977. Bloodless castrator. The Veterinary Record100, 215.

Cox, J.E., 1977. Bloodless castrators. The Veterinary Record 100, 431–432.

Kent, J.E., Thrusfield, I.S., Robertson, I.S., Molony, V., 1996.Castration of calves; a study of the methods used by farmers inthe United Kingdom. The Veterinary Record 138, 384–387.

Knight, T.W., Cosgrove, G.P., Death, A.F., Anderson, C.B., 2000.Effect of method of castrating bulls on their growth rate andliveweight. New Zealand Journal of Agricultural Research 43, 187–192.

Miller, W.C., 1935. Black�s Veterinary Dictionary. A & C Black Ltd.,London, UK.

Molony, V., Kent, J.E., Robertson, I.S., 1995. Assessment of acute andchronic pain after different methods of castration of calves. AppliedAnimal Behaviour Science 46, 33–48.

Robertson, I.S., Kent, J.E., Molony, V., 1994. Effects of differentmethods of castration on behaviour and plasma cortisol in calves ofthree ages. Research in Veterinary Science 56, 8–17.

Stafford, K.J., Mellor, D.J., Todd, S.E., Bruce, R.A., Ward, R.N., 2002.Effects of local anaesthesia or local anaesthesia plus a non-steroidal

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anti-inflammatory drug on the acute cortisol response of calves to fivedifferent methods of castration. Research in Veterinary Science 73,61–70.

Stafford, K.J., Mellor, D.J., 2005. The welfare significance of thecastration of cattle: a review. New Zealand Veterinary Journal 53,271–278.

Stafford, K.J., Mellor, D.J., Dooley, A.E., Smeaton, D., McDer-mott, A., 2005. The cost of alleviating the pain caused by the

castration of beef calves. Proceedings of the New ZealandSociety of Animal Production 65, 123–126.

Thuer, S., Mellema, S., Doherr, M.G., Wechsler, B., Nuss, K.,Steiner, A., 2007. Effect of local anaesthesia on short- and long-term pain induced by two bloodless castration methods in calves.The Veterinary Journal 173, 333–342.

Weaver, A.D., 1986. Bovine Surgery and Lameness. BlackwellScientific Publications, UK.