Freeze brands

Freeze brands are the bane of all milk recorders! There I’ve said it now. What is the point in freeze branding a number on a cows bum or other part of its anatomy if you can’t actually read it? 

At todays farm the heifers this year all start 2000 but instead of being able to read the whole number you get 204_ or 20_9 or even just 20_ _ ! This means to get the right number we have to try and read the ear tag, not easy when you are below the cow in the pit! I have since spoken to the freeze branding man who is going to come back and try and make them readable!

The other problem is when the number is completely wrong, which happens sometimes by accident or stupidity! When you work with cows day in day out you get to know them and a good dairyman will know his cows. When I was milking I knew them and can still picture certain ones going back 30 years! Now I work with eight different herds the same numbers crop up making it more difficult to remember them although I do have a soft spot for the red ones and can remember most of them in 4 or 5 herds. Sometimes the brands are just mucky and I have to use a scraper to clean it up so it’s ledgible, sometimes the farms are helpful and actually clip the brands beforehand.

On one farm they have taken things to a higher level, the cows all wear  a collar with their number on, that matches the freeze brand and even more importantly has auto I.D that flashes up in the parlour and links to the computer. It’s so easy! They do on occasion lose their collar and bizarrely one came in the other day wearing someone else’s but that’s a minor problem! We all love auto I.D!

I did have to query though why 275 was wearing 1276 but nobody knew the answer!

 

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