A Texas livestock brand is only yours if you re-record it every ten years

A cattle brand isn't registered once and forgotten. Texas Agriculture Code 144.044 puts every brand and earmark on a ten-year clock, and they're all re-recorded together with the County Clerk in the county where the livestock run. The current window opened August 31, 2021 and runs through August 31, 2031, and a brand that doesn't get re-recorded during the six-month renewal period loses all legal force and goes back into the public pool for someone else to grab.

That's why an old family brand passed down on memory and a faded bill of sale isn't enough. If it wasn't renewed in the last cycle, on paper it may belong to no one, or to whoever recorded it next. The brand has to be filed in this county to protect stock that live here, even if Grandad first registered it in 1955.

If you're buying cattle, leasing grazing, or dusting off a family iron, the Nueces County Clerk can tell you whether a brand is current and on file. Recording the brand is about ownership marks, a separate thing from the animal-health and movement records the state keeps.