Need Help Setting Up ID System/Record Keeping

[Egghead_Jr]

In my state NPIP birds are leg banded. It doesn't get more specific to bird than a serial number. Had leg banded birds for years now. They forget all about the band after few days.

I like the idea of toe punch for pen groups. Makes sense for ease of identification to pull birds from flock when it's time to set up breeding pens. Don't see a need to get much more fancy than that when in conjunction with long numbered bands. NPIP bands are something like 6 numbers long, it's very bird specific. With that kind of info you can easily record exactly who the sire and dam is of every bird. At least group of potential mothers per bird if setting up quads.

 

[Storybook Farm]

Yeah, WV doesn’t band. On the upside, NPIP inspection is free,

 

[WVduckchick]

Following along for ideas.

The only problem i ever had with leg bands is I forgot about one on a feathered leg chick.
And they can break and get lost. Make sure you have a plan to monitor them, if you use them.

 

[Egghead_Jr]

It's free here too. Funny thing is people found it too demanding with the need of being home to catch every bird for inspection or the fact they can't introduce non NPIP birds to flock they stopped doing it. At my last inspection was told I was one of two private citizens left in the program for my state.

I've yet to set up a large scale tracking system. Very few birds used for breeding so far that all I use currently is notepad in windows. Type in notes about birds with dates and use the last three digits of leg bands to identify breeders. From there the chicks are identified by group as in this hatch/age group are F2 and this group is F1BC1 or whatever that birds lineage is. That suffices until 5 months age requirement for next annual NPIP inspection and banding. From there I start typing in notes about specific potential breeders with ID number. Keep that Notepad file on desktop with another desktop file holding photos of specific birds (change name of photo to bird ID and age). Not being many years into this variety and concerned with few breeder quality birds this very simple method is adequate. Likely the only thing I'll change is moving the info to a word program like Google Docs. That way the info is stored online incase of computer problems and the photos can be inserted next to the notes on each bird. In the long run a page for line breeding can be created on Google Sheets. Using the grid system of excel or sheets to illustrate family tree so you can prevent too close of inbreeding in the long years ahead.

 

[IdyllwildAcres]

Hmm no experience at all but here goes...

Paint their toenails

Thats all I got

Gary

 

[Brahma Chicken5000]

Hmm no experience at all but here goes...

Paint their toenails

Thats all I got

Gary

Painting toenails with nail polish isn’t ideal. They’ll get it dirty before it has a chance to dry. Not to mention I wouldn’t want my birds to eat it.

 

[IdyllwildAcres]

Painting toenails with nail polish isn’t ideal. They’ll get it dirty before it has a chance to dry. Not to mention I wouldn’t want my birds to eat it.

Lol, I was kidding. Sounds like you speak from experience!

G

Edited to add, I would not go back to that salon then!

 

[Brahma Chicken5000]

Did that the first time I got chicks. They rubbed it off within an hour.

 

[Storybook Farm]

So, since I OP’d, I’ve been experimenting with ZooEasy (online version). There are definitely pros and cons so far, but overall, it’s good. For posterity, I’ll list my impressions after having messed with it for about 6 weeks.

PROs:

1. I can use in on my iPad. (In my Prime years here—retired—I’m not using my aged—and dying—computer for much, but I live on my iPad(s) and phone. Therefore, I like that the data is in the cloud for everyday use.

2. Similarly, can switch between devices seamlessly. IF my computer were working, I’d bea able to call it up on phone, tablet, or computer with equal ease.

3. The interface is quite intuitive, and you can learn it without help pretty fast.

4. It does extended pedigrees, allows you to enter custom fields, and also tells percentages of genetic relations effortlessly. You can mount ONE picture per bird (wish it was more, and maybe you can, but I can’t get ahold of a manual—see #3 below).

5. Overall, I figure this program would meet my needs; my biggest beef is that I want an operations manual in order to understand finer points/customization options before committing to it all the way.

CONs:
1. The information is in the cloud. In an extended power outage — or national catastrophe — I’d be lacking this information. On the flip side of this, though, if there were that much of a problem with the national grid, I wouldn’t care about records. I’d be eating chicken a lot.

2. The online version is subscription: amounts to about $60/year. I don’t think that’s exhorbitant if you’re a serious private breeder... and you can pay more and get more features if you’re a group of partners breeding, which I have vision for down the road. (Also, you can totally avoid this con by buying the stand-alone version: one time cost of $60. But it’s a bit unclear whether you HAVE to, or GET to, upgrade yearly. Again, see frustration with a lack of customer service replies in #3 below.)

3. BIGGEST ONE: their customer service is distinctly lacking. I’ve emailed them four times over the six weeks. Twice at first, and then twice during the holiday season. They did respond to the last one, which said “I’m disappointed in a lack of response so I’m not going to use your product.” THAT one got a response that blamed it on the holiday season.... Hmmm. Time will tell. They said that after 1/12 they’d be more responsive. I’m willing to try, and will try to update here how this goes.

 

[Storybook Farm]

Very interesting. I will be breeding chickens in a few years and I was also brainstorming ideas of how to keep records. So here are my thoughts:
I will use leg bands of different colors on all my breeding stock. That would mean that I could reuse numbers in combination with a different leg and color. I will use a different number for each breeding pen and the birds will be be banded with a number and a letter as week as H for Hen & R for Rooster ie. Light Brahma Rooster would be Y1R07B
Y is for yellow leg band,1 refers to breeding pen, R is for rooster, 07 means he was banded seventh, B is for brahma. I would keep separate notebooks for each pen as well as each breed. These are just my ideas I hope they help you.

I’ve been using plastic leg bands and can’t keep them on my hens. Grrrr. BUT I do like how visible they are.

For anyone reading this: I contacted National Band and Tag Company online and they were super nice and sent me free samples of the sizes they offer of wing bands, because I have decided that I want to band chicks early and yet make sure that the bands will be big enough for my mature large fowl birds. (I also note, for the record, that NB&TC offers aluminum butt end leg bands which I think would stay on... but I’m interested in giving one number ONCE to each bird. If I used the butt leg bands, I’d have to change them as the bird grew... too much trouble for me. But: the main problem I have with wing bands is that you have to catch the bird to know what you’re observing, whereas plastic leg bands are highly visible.)

THEREFORE: here’s my current plan. I plan to wing band chicks at two weeks. I plan to let chicks grow to near maturity (using wing bands for the records of growth when I’m doing weekly weigh ins) and then as I get to final culling decisions, put plastic leg bands on them AS WELL so that I can record observations and take pictures without needing to catch them. If they throw the plastic band, usually I can retreive it, and I can re-identify/leg band the bird and still be sure (using the wing band) that all my records for that bird are kept straight. Whew!