Alexandra Green, the study’s lead author, says that her team found that cows express excitement, arousal, engagement or distress through slightly different moos.
“Cows are gregarious, social animals. In one sense it isn’t surprising they assert their individual identity throughout their life. This is the first time we have been able to analyze voice to have conclusive evidence of this trait,” Green said.
In the study, Green and her team recorded and analyzed cows as they spoke, collecting 333 samples of cow noises, and found that the noises were correlated with specific emotions.
“They have all got very distinct voices. Even without looking at them in the herd, I can tell which one is making a noise just based on her voice,” Green said.
Associate Professor Cameron Clark, described the research as “building a Google translate for cows.”
Green said that she hopes her research would help farmers “tune into the emotional state of their cattle, improving animal welfare”.
A 2016 study conducted at the University of Nottingham had similar results, showing that cows make unique noises to communicate with their offspring.