It began with the horse whisperer – the concept, the practice, the novel, the Robert Redford movie and the numerous horse whisperers and murmurers and pretenders who followed in the wake of it all.
Then came the dog whisperer – the concept, the practice, the show on National Geographic television.
So of course it was only a matter of time until the cow whisperer arrived on the scene, though it appears to be in the concept stage and it could be a long wait for the movie.
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“COMING TO A THEATRE NEAR YOU – Clint Eastwood, Kathy Bates, Elsie the cow and a herd of extras, in a blockbuster sure to udderly delight…”
Scene 1 in the promo: A careworn Clint, shard of straw clenched in dust-speckled teeth, leans over a corral of milling beasts. He puts his chapped lips close to a hairy bovine ear: “Do you feel lucky, Elsie?”
But we digress. According to a report by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, animal scientist Dean M. Anderson has devised a way to whisper commands to cows through a device similar to a Walkman headset.
He wears the Walkman and the cows wear a unit described as doughnut-shaped, which fits over their ears.
Cattle folks, let us pause here to reflect upon how often cows of our acquaintance have responded to whispered commands. Picture a herd of yearling heifers after their first sight and scent of spring grass …
That didn’t take long, did it?
But again, like the aforementioned herd of heifers, we digress.
It turns out Anderson has also patented technology for virtual fencing, called Directional Virtual Fencing, that gives cows signals to keep them within a specific area. His whispering technique follows along the same line. It uses a combination of global positioning, WiFi, magnetometers and accelerometers that record the animals’ body orientation.
In other words, if Mathuselah is headed back through that hole in the fence, instead of forward with the rest of the herd, some electronic device is going to know about it.
As for the whispering part: “The commands vary from the familiar ‘gathering songs’ sung by cowboys during manual roundups, to irritating sounds such as sirens and even mild electric stimulation if necessary to get cows to move or avoid penetrating forbidden boundaries,” says a USDA News release
news.
OK, now this futuristic technology is becoming clearer.
“I know what you’re thinking, Elsie. Did I give you two electronic directives or only one? Well, to tell you the truth, in all this excitement, I’ve kind of lost track myself.”
