[Isla]

Hello.

My ANxBS is due to kid next week.  She is registered and I have a service certificate.

I'm a BGS member and went on to Grassroots to see what's involved in registering the kids.  I'll need to put in a tag number.  How do I get a tag number?

I went on to Dalton Tag site (my goats have had success with pastern tags and I have the Dalton ear tag applicator).  From what I can gather, I can choose the ear tag colour.  My goats have purple ear tags.  Any reason I should chose another colour?

Male kids will be raised for meat.  I'll need to tag them, right?  But there's no point registering them, correct?

My other goat is due to kid at the start of May.  Could I just wait for her to kid and then order tags and complete registration all in one go?

[Anke]

If these are your first goats or sheep your tags (ordered from Daltons in any colour other than red or black) will start with your herd number and then the second number starts from 00001. You probably have to order a minimum number of tags, so they will last you a few years. Your registration number will not be on the tags, and yes only the female needs to be registered - cheaper to do before they are 6 months old. I usually wait until they are at least 4 - 6 weeks old, just to make sure they are viable etc. Castrated boys cannot be registered, entire male kids yes - but more expensive and only useful if they are to be used for breeding. I assume any boys will be castrated? But wether kids will need tagged to go to abattoir, in theory only a single slaughter tag if younger than 1 yo. I have always just double tagged the boys too, it's not that much more expensive for double tags vs single tags if you only have a few goats. But then mine are often GG boys and I leave them until oder than 1yo.

You don't need to tag until the kids are 6 months old or when they leave the holding, whichever is sooner. Vet visit for disbudding doesn't count.

[Buttermilk]

Choose a colour tag that you find easy to read. Some people rotate colours as it can be easier to see how old the animals are.  This is more important with larger numbers of animals though.