Several years ago, I spent some time in New Zealand on sheep and cattle ranches with veterinarian, Dr. John Southworth. Dr. Southworth was interested in the Callicrate Bander for use on cattle and sheep.

We compared the Callicrate Bander to the traditional “Cheerio” type elastrator rings on a set of his lambs. The lambs ranged in size from newborn, which had testicles small enough that the elastrator rings would fit, to big lambs which had testicles too large for the elastrator rings, but just right for the Callicrate Bander.

We were both impressed in a good way (The Callicrate Bander) and in a very troubling way (elastrator rings). All the lambs receiving the elastrator rings showed extreme discomfort. They were rolling around bleating and kicking. The lambs, both newborn and big lambs, which had the high-tension Callicrate bands applied, were comfortable and back suckling their mothers right away. We checked on the lambs frequently. The elastrator lambs were still showing signs of pain 12 hours later. The Callicrate Bander lambs were lying around comfortably and nursing.

We have seen the same results in cattle. I don’t know of anything more stressful to an animal than applying an elastrator ring, which lacks sufficient tension to ligate (provide sufficient tension/compression to shut off the blood supply and block pain) the body part.

A high-tension band, such as that used with the Callicrate Bander and the Callicrate ‘WEE’ Bander, is by far the least stressful to both the animal and the person performing the castration.

Mike Callicrate

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