deep in the southeastern corner of Idaho | We went to freeze branding everything that is kept past weaning. Calves get an ear tag to match the mothers number at birth, usually the tags will last until weaning after that I don't depend on them. We Freeze brand all bulls, sale heifers and replacement heifers for several reasons. By the time we get to our production sale the animals are loaded with tags. Lot numbers, tric tags, Herd tags. Then they go to the new owners who put their brand on them, cut out all but the tric tags and put their own tags in them. By fall they have lost the records of the new tag numbers and are scratching their heads as to what is the age of that bull or is he a growth bull or a calving ease bull. We have tried to help our buyers with our numbering and tagging.
We tried the BIF Alpha number for a few years (47C, 83D) but our buyers and ourselves didn't like the letters. Those that remembered what they stood for got tired of looking up what year the C or D stood for. So we went to using the first digit to represent the year born then the other digits were the dam's ID number.
All Heifers get a permanent ID number at the end of their registered name with the first digit representing the birth year (801, 802). First heifer born in 2018 and so on. This is freeze branded in a stack on left shoulder. Doing it this way the new owner usually always keeps that number as her life long ID and they can match that to their registration papers that are stacked in the back of file cabinet or kept digitally.
Bulls then get a similar system. 4 numbers in a stack on left shoulder. 1st number year born next numbers dam's ID but doing it this way the second number in the stack will tell you what year the Dam was born. Some buyers like bulls from young cows (fresher genetics) some like bulls from older cows (tried and true producers). Now our buyers know exactly age of bulls and has eliminated a lot of guessing to the true ID of their bulls. I like it because as I make herd visits and we tour the bulls it is clear which bulls we sold them and I can quickly look up any information needed during our conversation out in the field.
For what it is worth |
How do you tag your cattle?
