Tips to designing a livestock branding iron you can be proud of.
Imagine your livestock went missing! You reported it to your local stockmen’s association. You get a call from a distant sale yard that they may have found your animals. You drop what you’re doing, grab your branding iron to bring along for further proof, you can tell by looking at them they are yours. But the brands on the hide are so blotched they cannot be read. You can’t prove they are yours.
Design a clear and simple livestock brand!
I get it! Your brand is a reflection of you and your ranch and you want it to be special. Make sure your customers can read it. And don’t forget it’s all about the lost or stolen livestock!
Avoid complex brands
It’s not a fancy tattoo. It’s a scar. If you are freeze branding you’ve got a lot more options. It’s a good idea for your brand to work as an electric brand or a fire brand as you never know what the future holds.
Choose the most important character or symbol
This could be your initials or a reflection of your ranch name. If you already have a ranch name sometimes creating a brand from it that is simple can be difficult. Your brand and ranch name don’t have to coincide.
Think about overall size of your design for different sized livestock
The larger your characters can be the better it will turn out. Too many characters and your brand will end up way too big! Or you will want to make the characters too small to keep the overall size down. This is a definite no no if you want to find your missing livestock. Brands that don’t turn out are either too small or have too much going on and will almost always blotch.
Try to keep you branding iron under 4 characters
This is a general rule as the actual characters you choose and how they are placed together will be the deciding factor for a good clear livestock brand.
Call an expert for advice!
If you get stuck with a design idea or unsure of what you want to register as a livestock brand, it’s a good idea to give us a call. We are the only ones in the industry that brand our own livestock! We build our branding irons to work for you!