Freeze Branding

[Machias]

Got my new custom made freeze brand in the mail yesterday for the dogs.  Got it from Pittsburg Foundry.  They did a nice job.  It's 2 and 3/4 inches wide and just shy of 3 inches tall.  I'll try and take some good photos of the process and post them here.  Maybe a quick video as well of one of the dogs.

[gaddy]

Never heard of freeze branding. I'll tag along.

[headshot5]

We used to freeze brand cattle, works great on everything but white ones. 

[Machias]

We used to freeze brand cattle, works great on everything but white ones. 

Actually on white ones you hold the brand on longer and the hair will fall out and not regrow.  Actually shows up really nice.

[Machias]

Never heard of freeze branding. I'll tag along.

Not my dog, but here is an example.  Very similar to freeze branding a horse or cow.

[headshot5]

Yeah that looks good. 

[starbailey]

We've done our own horses for years. The hard part is trying to get them to stand still while holding the brand on. Most will take 45-60 seconds depending on color and age of horse.

[KopperBuck]

Looks good! We had L&H in North Dakota to do ours for the horses. They were good folks. Are you waiting until they’re full grown to do this? We did tattoos before. Never even thought of this on a dog!


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[Machias]

Two of my three are full grown, the male I have might have a little bit more growth, but not enough to distort the brand.  We almost went with L&H, just decided to try Pittsburg Foundry and they were super easy to work with.

[Machias]

Nice looking horse.  For the dogs if we use liquid nitrogen it take around 10 seconds.  Depends on where you brand them, some guys do the ears which will take a second or two less.  The darker the hair the less time.  If you use dry ice and alcohol it take longer 24 to 30 seconds.

[bearpaw]

We built our own brands by bending and brazing together 1/4 x 1" brass strap in the correct shape, then brazing on a long handle. We always used dry ice and alcohol and shaved off the hair from the area we were branding, back when there were more active hound hunters our club would have branding days that we would get together and do numerous dogs at the same time. I like the sound of nitrogen only taking 10 seconds.

[bearpaw]

Do you chip your dogs too Fred? I haven't freeze branded in quite a few years but sometimes think I still should do that for the visual deterrent.

[Machias]

Do you chip your dogs too Fred? I haven't freeze branded in quite a few years but sometimes think I still should do that for the visual deterrent.

I microchip, and my name and number is on their collars.  I figure the collars will help most of the time if someone finds them, the microchip will work if they are turned into a shelter and the freeze branding should help with preventing theft.

[bearpaw]

With the modern gps collars it seems like we almost never have dogs picked up by other people now, we are able to get to them first, but I have been considering freeze branding again just in case. We have an extra message tag on our collars to leave the dog if found, I think that helps too.

[Machias]

With the modern gps collars it seems like we almost never have dogs picked up by other people now, we are able to get to them first, but I have been considering freeze branding again just in case. We have an extra message tag on our collars to leave the dog if found, I think that helps too.

Great idea.  Mine says my name and number, but I might add that line, how did you word it on your collars?