Tattoo Equipment - Page 1

I looked at the www.hauptner-herberholz.de site and see there are various heights for letters/numbers. What height is standard for tattooing puppies? 5 mm, 7 mm, other? Thanks all, Tina

Reply Tina, presuming we are talking about the height, rather than the pitch of the characters I cannot answer that unless I measure the characters in my kit and it is not at my home right now. I would estimate the height of the numerals and characters in my kit to be about 10,0mm-12,0mm. I never knew they were available in different heights, but it does make sense. Like most people stateside, I purchased mine from Leerburg.com and presumed it was the "standard" size for a GSD puppy. I might add that if one uses all seven (7) available positions, that is quite long for many puppies. I never had a problem safely fitting all of them into the ear, but with some puppies I had to be very careful. The imprinted characters and numerals will "stretch" as the puppy's ears grow and are of course larger in size by maybe 50% when the puppy reaches adult size. This is interesting, as the only other tattoo kits of that I am familar are those used for cattle, and those digits are at least 20,0mm tall. Bob-O

Hi Tina, SV gets the equipment for out tattooer from Hauptner too and they use the 7mm clamp and digits. The 5mm-one is for smaller breeds or cats. Chris

Thank you Bob-o and Chris. It sounds like the 7 mm are the height to get.

While on the subject of tattoos I have a question. I am planning to get my 16 month old female ear tattooed by a local vet. She was not tattooed as a puppy obviously and I plan on trialing with her in Schutzhund. I have given preference to the ear as I am not keen on making her role over for a judge at a trial for a thigh tattoo and/or trying to make sure there is a reader available for a chip. Am I correct that I can have any sequence of alpha/numeric characters I choose? Thanks.

I just bought a new kit from Leerburg. It has the 7mm digits. I am no longer an "official" USA tattooer, because I am no longer a member of a "local" club. (defrocked!) but I tattoo my pups anyway, and micro-chip them with the AVID 10-digit Eurochips, which can be read by most scanners, AVID, Home Again, etc. with myself as the "pre-paid" irrevacable primary contact. I don't ever want to think one of my dogs might end up in some kill shelter somewhere and me never contacted. Best I can do.... Shelley Strohl

oconnoka - "Am I correct that I can have any sequence of alpha/numeric characters I choose?" I was under the impression that the tattoo is always the SV id # from the dog's German papers. If your dog is not dual registered, then I guess you could use the AKC number instead.

Shelley, We also tattoo and microchip. So far we've used the Avid chip and have a lifetime unlimited registration so any and all dogs or puppies we have wil be chipped. I have also been considering having them double chipped so it won't matter what style of reader is used, one will show up. I am planning on buying our own chip reader for when we travel. I don't think we can do too much to protect our dogs in this regard. oconnaka, Maybe somebody here can answer. Ours were tattooed using a combination of the kennels designation and numeric. the ones we had imported were tattooed by SV standards.

So, 7,0mm is the kit that I have. I just never paid attention to the size of the kit, and once again I learn something. The S.V.-applied tattoos have seven (7) digits, one (1) of which is usually a slash to designate a space. The characters and digits contained in the tattoo reflect the region of Germany where the puppy was born, the breeder, and finally the puppy. If a U.S.c.A. tattooer is available, the tattoo number can be obtained from the U.S.c.A. office. The tattoo has a similar sequence to the one done by the S.V.. Or, if you do them yourself-they just must be some unique combination. My scheme is as follows: Position 1=first letter of abbreviated kennel name. Position 2=second letter of abbreviated kennel name. Position 3=litter identifying character (A, B, C, etc.) Position 4=third digit of year of birth (0 for 2007). Position 5=fourth digit of year of birth (7 for 2007). Position 6= puppy registration number, usually zero if less than ten (10) puppies. Position 7=puppy registration number. In right ear, and normally readable when standing on the dog's right-hand side looking at the inside of the right-hand ear. Bob-O

Bob-O The scheme you use is similar to what some of ours have. VB04A4 as an example. The difference is the fifth position is the litter alpha designator. A, B, C, etc. Thanks all, time to order a kit. Tina