Speaker 1: Welcome to brain stuff from how stuff works, Hey, brain
Speaker 1: stuff luring vogel bomb Here. Let me take you to
Speaker 1: a farm. They're nineteen whole steam calves push their noses
Speaker 1: over waiste high fences around individual pens. They're milling about
Speaker 1: in a red barn the width of a soccer field.
Speaker 1: It's dinner time. They're hungry, and they've just spotted their
Speaker 1: favorite person, a farmer pulling a green wagon loaded with
Speaker 1: bottles of warm milk. He lifts the bottles and feeds
Speaker 1: each in turn, coaxing shy calves and hedging strong ones.
Speaker 1: As their tails whip and bellies full. The farmer rubs
Speaker 1: their necks and backs affectionately, scratching behind an ear too.
Speaker 1: A stereo plays classical music in the background, though its
Speaker 1: mellow tunes are temporarily eclipsed by the wreckless of the
Speaker 1: meal in its place. The farmer offers a soothing monologue
Speaker 1: that settles over the calves black and white coats. The farmer,
Speaker 1: Dean Patterson, tells us, when you feed a calf a
Speaker 1: bottle of milk, and when you rub him on his necker,
Speaker 1: on his back and makes him feel so much better,
Speaker 1: he'll load the empty bottles back onto his wagon and
Speaker 1: return them to the milking parlor, which is housed in
Speaker 1: another barn. There, he'll wash the bottles and leave them
Speaker 1: prepped for the evening feeding, but will continue to check
Speaker 1: on the calves throughout the day. Patterson, a seventy eight
Speaker 1: year old fourth generation farmer, is building relationships with these
Speaker 1: calves in the same way he's done for a lifetime
Speaker 1: at Patterson Family Farms. As at most conventional dairies, calves
Speaker 1: are separated from their mothers within a day or two
Speaker 1: of birth, then housed individually and in age related groups,
Speaker 1: where they rely on people for sustenance and affection. This
Speaker 1: connection between calf and caretaker has been at the center
Speaker 1: of a research project by the Institute of Animal Husbandry
Speaker 1: and Animal Welfare at vetmag Uni, Vienna, a university of
Speaker 1: veterinary medicine in Austria. Stephanie Lerzel and her colleagues studied
Speaker 1: a hundred and four Holstein Frisian calves at a commercial
Speaker 1: dairy farm in Germany from birth to day fourteen. They
Speaker 1: stroked the next of half of the calves for three
Speaker 1: minutes a day and did not pet the other half
Speaker 1: of the group. By day ninety the calves would experience
Speaker 1: to neck rubs weighed more than the control group by
Speaker 1: a seemingly small but completely significant three percent. This points
Speaker 1: to the positive influence of gentle human interaction on animal
Speaker 1: weight gain. Researchers also observed the quality of relationships between
Speaker 1: calves and caretakers through an avoidance distance test. The test,
Speaker 1: which measures the distance at which a calf will avoid
Speaker 1: a person who approaches it head on, revealed these stroked
Speaker 1: calves had a lower avoidance distance than the calves in
Speaker 1: the control group. In short, the calves who had been
Speaker 1: given special attention early on in their lives were less
Speaker 1: fearful and more welcoming when approached by people. While these
Speaker 1: results may seem elementary to people who have worked with animals,
Speaker 1: studying the emotional impact of humans on animals in commercial
Speaker 1: production is an emerging field that could have a far
Speaker 1: reaching impact on the animals environments. Previous studies have shown
Speaker 1: that when heffer's gain weight more quickly, they go on
Speaker 1: to produce more milk. For the calves in the vet
Speaker 1: mead Uni Vienna study, their three percent weight gain could
Speaker 1: translate into fifty that's a hundred and ten pounds more
Speaker 1: milk per cow per year, says Lurzel, and in two
Speaker 1: thousand one, a pair of psychologists at England's University of
Speaker 1: Lester demonstrated that playing soothing music to dairy cows increased
Speaker 1: their milk production. Strategies like this aren't new to the
Speaker 1: Patterson Dairy, where classical music is played for cows and
Speaker 1: calves around the clock, says Diana Lanier, who earned a
Speaker 1: bachelor's degree in animal science production management before returning to
Speaker 1: Patterson Family Farms to work alongside her grandfather, Dean Patterson,
Speaker 1: and her father and brother. Lanier said, there are a
Speaker 1: lot of things you can do to make cows more
Speaker 1: comfortable and show them you care for them. In turn,
Speaker 1: they will grow better, produce more milk, and give higher
Speaker 1: quality milk. The more you care for them, the more
Speaker 1: you get out of that relationship. Today's episode was written
Speaker 1: by Laurie L. Dove and produced by Tyler Clang. For
Speaker 1: more on this and lots of other productive topics, visit
Speaker 1: our home planet, how Stuff Works dot com.