DOMESTIC CALVES (BOS-TAURUS) RECOGNIZE THEIR OWN MOTHERS BY AUDITORY CUES

The goal of this study was to determine if auditory cues are important in maternal recognition by domestic cattle calves, Bos taurus. Cows a nd their calves were separated and the vocalizations of the mothers we re recorded. During experimental playbacks in a rest enclosure, each c alf (n = 9) was given a choice between a tape-recorded vocalization of its mother and that of a strange mother. Calves significantly preferr ed their own mother's vocalization as compared to the vocalization of the unfamiliar mother. Calves spent significantly more rime near the s peaker that played their own mother's call, and approached significant ly closer to their mother's speaker. These results demonstrate that 3- 5-wk-old calves can recognize their mothers by auditory cues alone. Vi sual inspection of audiospectrograms of the cows' vocalizations sugges ts that there are individual differences among cows.