In the UK horns were burned off young calves with a hot iron, still done today with electic models (like a large soldering iron) only painful if you touched your hand with it (sorry, poor joke!!) - polled is a term for horned cattle in the UK (not to be confused with a pole axe, used to stun cattle prior to slaughter). Similar action tools can be found as garden secateurs, but usually much lighter in construction, and using levers rather than a rack and pinion.