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Guidance

Register as a cattle keeper with the British Cattle Movement Service

How to register or re-register your holding with the British Cattle Movement Service (BCMS) and what to do if your details change.

From:
Rural Payments Agency and British Cattle Movement Service
Published:
23 July 2026

Applies to England and Wales

Introduction

Before you move cattle, bison or buffalo onto your holding, you must register or re-register your new or reopened county parish holding (CPH) number with BCMS. This is so that you can:

Registering means cattle can be traced to prevent and contain the outbreak of disease.

You can find out more in our guide to keeping cattle, bison and buffalo in England and Wales.

Register as a cattle keeper

To register you’ll need: 

  • your CPH number 

  • your single business identifier (SBI) 

You should not move any cattle, bison or buffalo onto the holding until you have registered with the BCMS. But if you have moved any before registering, you must use the form to give their official ear tag numbers and the dates that they moved.

Start now

After you submit the form, BCMS will register you as a cattle keeper and send you:

  • a letter confirming your details are on their Cattle Tracing System (CTS) database
  • barcode labels to use in passports
  • a reference number to use when setting up a CTS Online account 
  • a password for CTS Web Services so you can use approved farm software

You can use CTS Online to register cattle births and report movements and deaths.

What you need to do next

Make sure you have also contacted the Animal and Plant Health Agency (APHA) to tell them you intend to keep cattle. This is so that APHA can send you a herd mark to identify cattle born on your holding.

You must do this:

  • before moving cattle onto your holding
  • even if you do not plan to rear calves

Find out how to register with APHA and get a herd mark.

If anything changes

You must report any changes to your registered details as soon as possible and within 30 days.

This includes changes to:

  • your address
  • your telephone number
  • the name of your business
  • where you plan to keep livestock
  • the species of livestock you keep
  • ownership of your holding

Find out how to update your holding details.

Updates to this page

Published 23 July 2026

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