If you purchase a retired race horse and have no registration papers, you can use their tattoo to find out the registered name (free) and even information about their racing career (for a fee). This tattoo can also be useful in identifying stolen horses.
A Thoroughbred tattoo has one letter, which indicates the year of birth, followed by four or five numbers, with horses over 25 years of age having only four. Horses foaled outside North America will also have an asterisk (*) at the beginning of the tattoo. The Jockey Club has a free tattoo lookup and research service here as well as a Tattoo Frequently Asked Questions.
A Standardbred tattoo always has five characters, either a letter and four numbers or two letters and three numbers. The first letter in the tattoo indicates the year of birth. You can look up a Standardbred tattoo online for free here. There is also a list of all tattoo numbers by horse name for foals of 1996 and later here for horse identifiers at race tracks to use.
A Quarter Horse tattoo has four or five numbers followed by a letter, making it easy to tell from a Thoroughbred tattoo. You can get more info about Quarter Horse tattoos and registration here and AQHA will look up a tatto number for free if you call them at 806-376-4811.
Most Appaloosas are tattooed whether they raced or not, and some info about their marks is available here. Arabians are also tattooed with the last six digits of the horse's registration certificate number.
Lip tattoos are applied by technicians licensed through the Thoroughbred Racing Protective Bureau, and more information about the tattoos and how they came to be used can be found here. They also offer a free service to research your horse's tattoo to find the registered name.
Below is a chart showing the year of birth associated with the letter in the lip tattoo for Thoroughbred and Standardbred horses. If there are two letters in a Standarbred's tattoo, it is the first one that tells the year of birth.
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Thoroughbreds A = 1971 B = 1972 C = 1973 D = 1974 E = 1975 F = 1976 G = 1977 H = 1978 I = 1979 J = 1980 K = 1981 L = 1982 M = 1983 N = 1984 O = 1985 P = 1986 Q = 1987 R = 1988 S = 1989 T = 1990 U = 1991 V = 1992 W = 1993 X = 1994 Y = 1995 Z = 1996 A = 1997 B = 1998 C = 1999 D = 2000 E = 2001 F = 2002 G = 2003 H = 2004 I = 2005 J = 2006 K = 2007 L = 2008 |
Standardbreds P = 1971 Q = 1972 R = 1973 S = 1974 T = 1975 U = 1976 V = 1977 W = 1978 X = 1979 Y = 1980 Z = 1981 A = 1982 B = 1983 C = 1984 D = 1985 E = 1986 F = 1987 G = 1988 H = 1989 J = 1990 K = 1991 L = 1992 M = 1993 N = 1994 P = 1995 R = 1996 S = 1997 T = 1998 V = 1999 W = 2000 X = 2001 Z = 2002 A = 2003 B = 2004 C = 2005 D = 2006 E = 2007 F = 2008 |
