I'm gonna guess less than 5% of the cattle "here" in this area are branded.  And very few of those are for ownership purposes only (registered brand), most also inculde an individual animal number as part of the brand, (thinking number freeze brands in this example). 

As for our breeding animals (yes, even those that aren't registered), they're all tattooed in both ears and tagged with the tattoo number. 

Only way to keep really good records is to have a permanent individual identity, and there is NO such thing as a permanent ear TAG.  One registered brand for the entire herd doesn't work in this case.