This set of Angus bulls at a Bradley 3 Ranch production sale some years ago shows that branding is a permanent means of identifi cation that can be seen from a distance.
Fire branding is not the only
The star is the brand of the State of Texas. This freeze brand indicates this horse is part of the Texas Department of Criminal Justice’s program.
method. Gray says some regis- tered herd owners use freeze branding, particularly if they have a smaller herd of Angus, Red Angus or Brangus. “It’s a little bit more time consuming,” he says. “You have to prepare the brand site to receive that freeze brand — shave that area and rub it down with alcohol to get any grease and moisture off before you do it.” It’s also more costly. Gray says,
“Liquid nitrogen, which you use for freeze branding, has gotten extremely expensive now. Plus, you also have to have the canister to hold the liquid nitrogen, and those are expensive and cumber- some to carry around. “You have to have a different
type of iron for freeze branding, a brass iron. You can do it with a branding iron, but it’s not as good.” But he says it makes a very
pretty brand, particularly on hors- es because they have less hair and the hide’s not quite as thick.
Brand registration in years that end in ‘1’ In Texas, brands are registered county by county by the county
68 The Cattleman January 2014
clerk, and in turn the clerk is required by law to send those registrations to TSCRA. The brands are entered into a database, which has more than 182,000 regis- tered marks from the last 2 brand registration periods. Brands are registered in Texas every 10 years, in the years that end in 1. The last registration period began in 2011. The holder of the brand has 6 months from the end of the last registration year to re-register it. After the grace period, if you have not re-registered that particular brand, it’s up for grabs. If when attempting to register a brand you discover
someone else in the same county already has rights to it, you would have to alter it. Most commonly, produc- ers will put a rafter over their brand or a bar under it. “You have to satisfy that county clerk that your brand is different enough from a similar brand that’s already recorded for them to be able to register it,” says Gray. “That’s a call that the clerk makes on the county level.”
Brand certifi cate as evidence He says ranchers have gotten better about getting
brands registered. “They realize it is a means of identi- fi cation, and for it to be a legal means of identifi cation, it has to be registered,” he says. If cattle are stolen and the brand isn’t registered,
the TSCRA special rangers will still seek out the stolen property. The owner, however, may run into trouble if the case goes to court and the defendant asks if they can produce a brand certifi cate from their county clerk. Gray says, “If they say no, the defense attorney can say that could be a brand registered 2 counties over. They could go to the brand registration and say, ‘That brand is registered in 50 other counties in the state of Texas. You don’t have it registered at all. How can you prove that is your animal?’”
thecattlemanmagazine.com
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