Start With the Braque's Identity Section
A complete record file for a Braque du Bourbonnais opens with who this dog is: registered name, microchip number, date of birth, breeder contact, and a clear standing photo showing the breed's ticked coat and naturally short tail. Add your own contact details and your veterinarian's name on that same first page. For a French pointing breed that may travel to hunts, trials, or boarding kennels, anyone handed the file should identify the dog and reach you within the first minute of opening it.
Health Records a Pointing Dog Actually Generates
The health section of a Braque du Bourbonnais file holds vaccination records, parasite prevention dates, and notes from every vet visit in date order. Pointing dogs working in fields and cover pick up ticks, burrs, and minor cuts more often than house-only dogs, so log field injuries and ear checks alongside formal appointments. Keep any hip or eye screening paperwork from the breeder in this section too, since gundog buyers and future vets both ask for it. File each new document the week it arrives rather than letting certificates pile up in a drawer.
Weight, Condition, and Hunting-Season Notes
A Braque du Bourbonnais in hard hunting condition looks visibly leaner than the same dog in the off season, and a dated weight log is what separates a healthy seasonal swing from real weight loss. Weigh monthly outside the season and every few weeks during it, noting food amounts beside each entry. Add short notes on stamina, appetite, and coat condition after long field days. When a vet later asks how long a change has been building, this running log answers with dates instead of guesses.
Training and Travel Paperwork in One Place
Braque du Bourbonnais records also include the non-medical paper trail: training milestones, field trial or hunt test results, travel documents, and boarding vaccination proofs. Keep a separate divider for permissions and contacts, listing who may collect the dog from boarding and who can authorize care if you are unreachable. Review this section before every trip, because expired vaccination proof is the most common reason a kennel turns a dog away at drop-off.
## Paper, Digital, or Both for a Braque File
A Braque du Bourbonnais file works best kept twice over: the paper originals in a single binder at home, and photographed or scanned copies stored with the digital record. Registration papers and signed breeder documents are awkward to replace, while day-to-day pages like the weight log change too often to reprint. Scan certificates once, update the living pages digitally, and note in the binder where the digital copy lives. Anyone covering for you during a hunt weekend then works from the same file whichever copy they open.
An Update Cadence That Keeps the File Complete
This Braque du Bourbonnais file stays complete on a simple cadence: add entries the same day care happens, reconcile the whole file once a month against receipts and appointment cards, and do a full review before hunting season and before any travel. Retire nothing; move outdated pages behind a back divider so the history stays intact. Storing the file in KinsLe as a Pet Passport keeps every section together in one portable packet, so the record you maintain at home is the same one a vet, sitter, or kennel sees.