My name is Josie Harper, and I am a sophomore in the University of Maine UMADCOWS program. If you come up to the farm, you’ll notice that each of our cows and most our calves and heifers have ear tags, and I thought that I would explain why we ear tag them and how to read them. In the pictures I’ve included, we have a mother and daughter pair to showcase the two main types of ear tags that you will see at Witter Farm. Ninja, the calf, has a circular white tag on her left ear. This has a number on it, which identifies her within our specific herd (she is Number 453). These tags also have their national registration number. This number stays with them for life and is also written on the blue ear tags, which I will go over in a minute. The white circular ear tags are also able to identify this specific cow anywhere she goes, and can be used to track where a cow came from and what herds she’s cycled through, or even if she comes from a different state or country. We only give the girls the white ear tags, since we plan on keeping them within the UMaine herd. The boys are given an ear tag in their right ear, which is orange instead of blue, and this not only identifies that they are boys, but it will also have their name and their date of birth written on the tag. Once the girls are old enough to be weaned, they are given their two blue ear tags that can be seen in the photo of Nile (Ninja’s mom). The one that goes on their right ear will have their name and birthday on it, and the one that goes in their left ear will have their parents’ names on it. So Nile’s ear tags say “Nile” on her right, and “Nefertiti” and “Racer” on her left. This helps us to track family bloodlines in the herd, and since both tags have their herd number on them, they are also an easy means of identifying any cow in the herd. We just put some blue ear tags on Dallas and Madeline in the calf barn this week, and we’ll be putting new tags on Ninja soon, so if you’d like, stop by the calf barn and check them out!
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