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Source: Navacord

Paperwork. Tedious, boring, time-consuming, but important. Why? For transportation, veterinary care, buying and selling, insurance, emergencies, and less-likely-but-heart-breaking-situations such as having your horse stolen. 

“Paperwork” includes proof of ownership such as registration papers or a bill of sale, breed registration, and veterinary records. No paperwork? How do you prove that the horse you bought and paid for (or are hauling in your trailer) is, in fact, yours? Or that it’s eligible for a show? Or that it is healthy, vaccinated, or has a negative Coggins test? 

Enter microchips. One of the best ways to prove ownership is via a microchip in your horse’s neck (or other location, depending on breed requirements). Microchips provide a permanent form of quick identification that is much more reliable than brands, tattoos, or paper records, which can be lost or altered. 

How do they work? A microchip — an electronic circuit the size of a grain of rice that has a unique identification number and can be read by a handheld wand — is inserted into the horse’s neck, lip, or other location, by a veterinarian. The average fee for microchipping is $100, and it’s only needed once in the horse’s lifetime. There is no annual or ongoing fee and updating the horse’s ownership record is free. 

Equestrian Canada’s country-coded “124-000” microchip, plus any other microchips already present in the horse, can be registered in the national Canadian Horse Identification Program (CHIP) database. 

If your horse is in an accident, lost, stolen, or becomes displaced for any reason, a veterinarian, breeder, buyer, or official can read their microchip with a handheld scanner and find out who the owner is and how to get in touch. While tattoos, brands, and paperwork may be altered or lost, microchips are a permanent form of identification, which can be used to monitor animal movement, trace animals during disease outbreaks, and prevent fraud at competitions. 

But microchips don’t just identify the horse; the CHIP database can store veterinary records, breed registration papers, insurance information, and any other documents that pertain to an individual animal.  

How is this useful? If you can’t remember when your horse was last vaccinated, dewormed, or had joint injections, you might end up repeating the work — and incurring costs that could be avoided. Although your regular vet keeps records, you may need access to the information during an out-of-town emergency or when selling your horse.  

In an age of decreasing transparency, paperwork — particularly easily accessible electronic data — helps build trust between buyer and seller and can speed up the purchase or sales process. 

Buying insurance or making a claim also requires proof of ownership and may require proof of value, too. Being able to quickly provide this documentation could result in faster service when needed. Storing that information in a database along with every other bit of information about your horse just simplifies the process. 

And then there are emergencies. With the increasing prevalence of wildfires and severe storms, it’s imperative for horse owners to be able to prove ownership. Although awful to think about, what if your horse gets loose or must be turned loose to fend for itself? How will someone identify him and get in touch once he’s caught? What if a horse trailer turns over during transportation and you need your veterinary records? What if your horse is stolen from its field and you want anyone who finds it to know how to contact you? In all these situations a microchip could help. 

Keeping physical paperwork together when travelling, showing, moving, or selling horses can be challenging. Being able to prove ownership and have access to veterinary records and insurance documentation during a stressful time can significantly lower anxiety and ensure that the documents you need are available when you need them. 

Consider replacing that pile of paperwork with a simpler way to keep your horse’s records together. Ask your vet to insert a unique, internationally approved Canadian microchip that can be read by a simple wand anywhere in the world. Then upload your horse’s documents all in one place. It’ll give you peace of mind and ensure that if your horse goes to a new owner, they’ve got all the information they’ll need to offer your horse a good life. 

Horses regularly have six to seven owners over the course of their lives. Transferring information through an electronic database simplifies changes in ownership and ensures important records stay with the horse, supporting its care for years to come. 

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Main Photo: AdobeStock/Carlo Prearo