It's all Trew: Branding is an old tradition

One thing cannot be argued, a healed brand is still the most visible, positive identifying process yet found. As examples of marking livestock, both legal and illegal, here are a few true stories with a bit of Trew flavor. Just how old are livestock brands? No one is sure but murals have been found in Egyptian tombs showing the branding of livestock. Early settlements dating from Moorish times required that in order to plant, raise and harvest crops, a practice called "transhumance" had to be carried out. This called for periodic removal of all livestock and large poultry from the cropping areas during the growing and harvesting seasons. The laws of the time, in order to prevent theft or mysterious loss of livestock, dictated all animals must be branded before being moved. Brands or painted markings were the only options available at the time to identify domestic stock or flocks. John Chisum, the famous rancher of the Pecos River Country, once caught and convicted a group of cattle rustlers who were changing one of the many brands he adopted when he bought and sold vast herds of cattle across Texas and New Mexico. The group had been acquitted by court once for theft because of "reasonable doubt." Evidently they were extremely clever in the alterations. Mr. Chisum set a trap by roping a number of odd marked steers and having his cowboys cut a small slit in the lower folds of the brisket and insert a silver coin into the slot which quickly healed over. Later, they caught the gang of thieves with some of the identifiable steers. With the law present as witnesses, the cowboys roped the steers and removed the coins as evidence. The thieves were sent to prison for long terms. Interestingly, I give a program about brands and have learned I can take the bare letter J without the top bar on the letter, and make every letter in the alphabet and numbers from 0 to 9. With patience, holding the iron at different angles, slants and touch-up, it can be done. Try it if you don't believe me...more