Numbering Convention for Tagging and Record Keeping

[Spot & Bubby]

I don't recall if I've mentioned it before, but I have a baby heifer and a bred heifer due in February. Pretty soon I'll have an empire. And as such, I'll need to keep track of my cattle and their performance. I'm thinking that since most have success using ear numbered ear tags, I'll use numbered ear tags. I thought about going super-basic and buying a set of sequential tags and calling it good, but I feel like I would be missing an opportunity going that route. Me being me, I immediately started overthinking all the ways I could number my cows and confused myself as much as possible before asking for input from the board. And here I am! (Hi )

My first heifer, Spot, has been sporting a custom tag for two years. It's lime green with her name and a daisy on it. It is no longer legible. Instead of going with name tags for her and Bubby, I want tags that give real information and I want that info to cascade onto their calves' tags and so on. Specifically, I want the year they were born, who their dam is, and what order (within their specific herd) they were born in, but I don't know if that's too complicated.

The system I'm thinking of using consists of a one digit year (letter), the last 2 digits of the dam's tag, and a single digit for birth order in my herd. I get a bonus heifer every year from the ranch and would number her "Y00#" with Y being the year, 00 representing the bonus, and # being the order she joined the herd. Spot would be K001, Bubby would be M002, the next would be N003. Their first calves would be N011, P02#, R03#. But it would break down in 2030, when I would have more than 10 calves to order. I randomly selected about half of the calves to be bulls, so their numbers aren't repeated as breeding cows.

(I realized after I had made the screenshot that when all calves are accounted for I can reorder the numbers so that only heifers are in order, without gaps.)
What's your opinion? What about this works and what doesn't? Is there a better way to keep the same information? How would you do it? How do you do it?

Looking forward to the comments!

 

[wbvs58]

I don't recall if I've mentioned it before, but I have a baby heifer and a bred heifer due in February. Pretty soon I'll have an empire. And as such, I'll need to keep track of my cattle and their performance. I'm thinking that since most have success using ear numbered ear tags, I'll use numbered ear tags. I thought about going super-basic and buying a set of sequential tags and calling it good, but I feel like I would be missing an opportunity going that route. Me being me, I immediately started overthinking all the ways I could number my cows and confused myself as much as possible before asking for input from the board. And here I am! (Hi )

My first heifer, Spot, has been sporting a custom tag for two years. It's lime green with her name and a daisy on it. It is no longer legible. Instead of going with name tags for her and Bubby, I want tags that give real information and I want that info to cascade onto their calves' tags and so on. Specifically, I want the year they were born, who their dam is, and what order (within their specific herd) they were born in, but I don't know if that's too complicated.

The system I'm thinking of using consists of a one digit year (letter), the last 2 digits of the dam's tag, and a single digit for birth order in my herd. I get a bonus heifer every year from the ranch and would number her "Y00#" with Y being the year, 00 representing the bonus, and # being the order she joined the herd. Spot would be K001, Bubby would be M002, the next would be N003. Their first calves would be N011, P02#, R03#. But it would break down in 2030, when I would have more than 10 calves to order. I randomly selected about half of the calves to be bulls, so their numbers aren't repeated as breeding cows.
View attachment 52508
(I realized after I had made the screenshot that when all calves are accounted for I can reorder the numbers so that only heifers are in order, without gaps.)
What's your opinion? What about this works and what doesn't? Is there a better way to keep the same information? How would you do it? How do you do it?

Looking forward to the comments!

I think you have mentioned it once or twice or thrice about your heifers. There is supposed to be a world wide convention for the year letter, I don't know what it is as in Australia we seem to go away from that convention, 2024 was the letter V here and I have been told before that this is wrong. I just use the year letter and the order they were born but I know people that put that other information on the tags either by incorporating with the calving order number or writing the cows ID/bull on the space left.

Ken

 

[Spot & Bubby]

I looked up the international letter code this afternoon. My brain sometimes rejects numbers if there are too many (meaning more than 3) in play at one time. That's why I'm leaning toward the letter system. How easily I'll be able to translate the letter remains to be seen, but 2024 is "M."

I think you have mentioned it once or twice or thrice about your heifers.

Gosh! I'm pretty proud of those heifers. I hope I don't look like a showoff for mentioning them too often. I'm certainly not trying to brag about my heifer calf and my bred heifer.

 

[wbvs58]

I looked up the international letter code this afternoon. My brain sometimes rejects numbers if there are too many (meaning more than 3) in play at one time. That's why I'm leaning toward the letter system. How easily I'll be able to translate the letter remains to be seen, but 2024 is "M."

Gosh! I'm pretty proud of those heifers. I hope I don't look like a showoff for mentioning them too often. I'm certainly not trying to brag about my heifer calf and my bred heifer.

That's alright Kati, we like enthusiasm.

Ken

 

[Silver]

My heifer calves are numbered by birth order followed by the year letter. Mother's number above. This gives a fair bit of info without having to refer to a herd book or the Dead Sea Scrolls or the Enigma machine to decode.

 

[ClintM]

We tag calves are as they're born. Heifers yellow tag, bulls white. They are numbered with first part of number being the cow and second part of number how many.
ie 4306 would be cow 43's 6th calf.
If we keep a heifer as replacement she gets a blue tag that has our brand on it and their number.

 

[Silver]

We tag calves are as they're born. Heifers yellow tag, bulls white. They are numbered with first part of number being the cow and second part of number how many.
ie 4306 would be cow 43's 6th calf.
If we keep a heifer as replacement she gets a blue tag that has our brand on it and their number.

What would 145's tenth calf be?

Edit: or 4306's 10th calf?

 

[chevytaHOE5674]

Pink tag heifer, blue tag steer. First two digits are the year born 2nd two/three digits are order born. Steers have an E before the number so that if someone reads a tag number in the chute or you see it on paper you know it's a steer. So E2367 is a steer born in 2023 #67 of the year, 2499 is a heifer born in 2024 #99 of the season.

If I need any cow/calf information I have to look in a book.

 

[Spot & Bubby]

We tag calves are as they're born. Heifers yellow tag, bulls white. They are numbered with first part of number being the cow and second part of number how many.
ie 4306 would be cow 43's 6th calf.
If we keep a heifer as replacement she gets a blue tag that has our brand on it and their number.

I'm thinking order each calf by season, not by cow. That way I can see who's calving early and who's late each season.

 

[Silver]

I'm thinking order each calf by season, not by cow. That way I can see who's calving early and who's late each season.

It is nice (and useful) to read a tag and at a glance know who the mother was, her age, and her order of birth which also indicates the cycle she was conceived in.
I don't want more than 4 characters in a line to keep the tag readable at distance. So I'm good with my current system unless I get to over 999 heifers born in a year

 

[RDFF]

I number mine somewhat similarly to Silver. I tag at birth, use green tags for the heifer calves, yellow tags for the bull calves (for some odd reason I don't ever seem to have a need for a color to designate confused critters). Makes it easy when sorting. If I keep one for a bull as a yearling, he gets a second matching yellow tag, so one in both ears.

I use the largest Y-Tex tags, right from the start. Main large numbering (in the center of the tag... most prominent and readable from a distance) is one (first) digit for the year in the decade in which they were born... so 2024 is a "4"... followed by "birth order" in the herd through the year, using TWO (or more if a large herd) digits. So 406 would be the 6th calf born in 2024. By the time you roll around to the next decade where you'd end up with the same first digit, most of those older ones have already left the herd, and you'll for sure know any remaining 12 year old from a two year old. If I bring in outsiders, they'll just get a properly colored (for their sex) "prenumbered" tag... easy to tell the difference from hand numbered, and they'll then normally only have a TWO digit number as well.

At the top of the tag in much smaller print (I want the center number to be readable from a distance, the rest not so much, so these are only like 1/2" numbers on my tags), I put their birth date... so 406 might have a 4-18 there... April 18, 2024. If you're not calving in a really tight window, you might have a good idea of "about" when a calf was born through the year just by its birth order number.

Across the bottom in similarly sized smaller print, I put their Dam's number. Again, I don't necessarily need these last two pieces of info on the tag, since I also have a herd record where it's all written down... but it's nice when working them not to have to always refer to the herd record.

I've used this numbering system all my life, including with our dairy with about 300 head (cows and youngstock). Pretty simple. For the dairy, we had various pastures and cattle groups. I made up a wooden spring clothespin with each critter's number on it. When they got moved to a different group or pasture (milking herd, baby calves, youngstock, bred heifers, close-ups in the dry cow pen, pasture #1, pasture #2, etc.), their pin got moved to a corresponding wire on the wall for that "location" or group. I could always know where any animal was supposed to be that way. When a cow calved, or got bred (all AI), her "pin" would get moved into the "first spot on the left end" in the "milking string" wire... so those were the ones that we would have to be watching for heats... 21 days after breeding... just look at the clothespin wire, and you had a good idea of who you needed to be watching because they might still be "coming into heat", and who was bred long enough to have settled. Conversely, the ones that have made it further down the line would be the ones that have settled, and then even further down would be those getting closer to needing to be dried up. My cousin laughed at me when I first put it up... nicknamed it the "Mickey Mouse Club". Now 50 years later, they're still using it.

 

[chevytaHOE5674]

I used to put a bunch of info on the tag. But have found over the years the only thing I really need in the field is the cows unique number.

Any other information is available on my phone within a few seconds.

"back in the day" when I had to dig thru notebooks back in the office more info on the tag was easier. Now more information that i really need is available at my fingertips where ever I am.

 

[Brute 23]

I used to put a bunch of info on the tag. But have found over the years the only thing I really need in the field is the cows unique number.

Any other information is available on my phone within a few seconds.

"back in the day" when I had to dig thru notebooks back in the office more info on the tag was easier. Now more information that i really need is available at my fingertips where ever I am.

I am the same way. Each animal gets a number in one ear and ranch tag with contact info in the other. Who belongs to who goes in a spreadsheet and we pull it up on our phones or I print out hard copies and have it on a clipboard/yellowpad or write them in a tally book.

All the cows get their ID# from the tag branded on them, with their year, and our brand on the hip for quick reference if needed.

 

[Named'em Tamed'em]

Calves get the letter for the year and mom's # with birth date

 

[GoWyo]

Calves get tagged to match cow # at birth. Replacement heifers get a number starting with their birth year (2024 heifers get # beginning with 4 and some combo of damage tag #, so 841's calf would be 484 or 441). Only have 10-15 replacements per year, so fairly easy to get numbers to reflect dam's tag and sort of keep tag numbers consistent with cow families. I understand my method, but no one else does. Then all data, pedigree, etc. is available on my phone with Angus Association app and I keep cowherd spreadsheets with AI dates, who bred to, which pasture they were in for cleanup and what bulls were in each pasture and observed or suspected cleanup breedings.

 

[wbvs58]

For herd improvement it is important to know which calf is from which cow whether it is from the tag or by referring to a paper document or your phone.

Ken

 

[SBMF 2015]

Hfr calves in the left ear bull calves in the right. Mother's number on the front, birthdate and sire on the back.
Any hfrs that are retained get their permanent number tag in their right ear, tattooed, ear noched, and freeze branded when they are pelvic measured.

 

[TCRanch]

My system is a cluster only I understand but it works for me. Let's use my oldest cow as an example. Bebe was number 4, born in 2010. Her first calf was 104 and she's due with 1404 in March. I've kept all her heifers except one (attitude!) and this year retained the heifer from Bebe's 8th calf, so Princess/804 had her 4th calf Leia/4804. Ranch initials, date of birth, calf number & name (don't judge) are on the back of the tag.

Heifer calves are tagged in the left ear, bull calves are tagged in the right. And I have a tag color system. Started our first calves (aforementioned Bebe) with white tags. All subsequent calves from our original cows had white tags. Next year, calves from retained heifers had yellow tags and all subsequent calves from those heifers/cows have yellow tags. Then orange, purple, red, green, pink, blue. When I ran out of colors, I started over with white.

 

[coachg]

My system is a lot simpler. First calf of 2024 gets tag 2401 . I write the # down along with the # of the cow and the date the calf was born . Young man next to us uses blue tags for bulls and pink for heifers , wonder where he got that idea ?

 

[RDFF]

1. I prefer strong "contrast" of the tag to the black ink I use, to make for easier to read tags from a distance. Green and Yellow (white is good too of course, but seems to blend in with the ink more if it gets dirty) appear to contrast and so are more readable to me than blue, or red or purple, for example.

2. So I use green tags for all the females (green = go, ...for a "keeper"... I'm still building herd numbers so generally will keep any heifers that breed basically, unless there's something really out of whack with them).

3. And then I use yellow tags for all the males (yellow = caution... could be a bull or a steer, but definitely "one for the butcher shop/sale barn" ultimately).

4. If I choose not to band a bull calf as a yearling (I let them all mature a bit before banding, to see how they develop) and therefore keep him as a bull, he gets a second tag with his same matching number in the other ear... so yellow tag in both ears is a bull, yellow tag in one ear is a steer, or still just a young yearling bull calf. Kids know which ones to watch out for more that way too. Makes it obvious for working and sorting them.

I don't put the second digit for the year because I want the primary number of the critter to be as big as possible on the tag... = more readable from a distance. So a 2024 calf will have the first digit as a "4"... the next two digits are the birth order of that calf in the herd that year... so 2024 calves would run 401 through 499... and if I had more calves than that, they'd get a 4 digit main number so the next one would be 4100, etc. Birth date and dam are in smaller print, above and below the main critter number, on the front of the tag.

I try not to have the tag look as "busy" as Silver's are in the pic above. Mostly can only read the main number from a distance. And I'll make the lines of that number about twice as heavily as Silver did, using the real marking ink that softens the tags for a while... that doesn't come off or fade as easily as the "Sharpie markers" do. You have to let the tags "cure" for a bit though... which is a pain and about impossible to accomodate when you're working them through the chute! That's why I tag them all as newborns first... and then only "retag" when working them through the chute as necessary, like if they've lost their original tag.

Custom guy's herd tags all the calves the same as their Mom... I like that for his herd, so I know how to pair them up.