Goats are buttheads!

You can call a goat a butthead and be technically correct!

Goats with horns are sometimes referred to as buttheads. Goats can be born with horns or without horns (the hornless trait is also called the polled trait).

Since the hornless trait is linked to an undesirable intersex trait that will cause the goat to be infertile, most breeders raise genetically horned goats.

In dairy animals, the horns can be inconvenient and dangerous during milking. Also, most dairy goats are so gentle that they can be lead around by a neck collar like a dog so additional handles are not needed.

For these reasons, dairy goat breeders will often dehorn goat kids in the first few weeks of life while the horn buds are barely palpable on the head. The most common way to accomplish this task is to use an electric disbudding iron to cauterize the horn growth.

Most goats that are raised for meat are left horned, because the horns are useful as handles while restraining these goats for routine procedures like vaccination, deworming and foot trims. These goats are typically handled less frequently than a milk goat. Regardless of breed, horns give a goat a fighting advantage, so it is best to have the whole herd either horned or hornless.

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