Thursday, July 30, 2009

Tatooing Systems

Since yesterday I went over different styles of tattooers, I thought it would be nice if I shared my tattooing system with everyone! I find this the be the most simple way of me being able to identify who the parents of certain animals are as well as a general idea of their age without having to dig out pedigrees. Another reason I like my system is that it is very hard to look at the ear numbers and tell right away that the animal was bred by me. I think judges are very observant and will usually catch on to tattooing systems of exhibitors so I try to make things as neutral as possible.

For my tattooing system, I start with the first letter of the sire's name followed by the first letter of the dam's name finished with a number. I usually start with one and go up to however many were in the litter. For example, I had a litter of seven out of Sundance and Sidney. Arista, a doe out of the litter, has the ear number of SS6. 'S' for Sundance, 'S' for Sidney, and she was the 6th one I tattooed. I used to number them in order of quality, but then I realized all the one's I kept had '1's in their ear numbers.

Everyone's systems are different, so I am definitely not trying to say stop what your doing and listen to me! I've seen some other systems that I really like and would do but they don't really work for my needs.

Have fun with tattooing for Convention hopefuls! :D

- Michael

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