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Scientists have documented a lot of animals that use tools, like chimps, sea otters and octopi, to name a few. NPR's Nate Rott reports a new animal has joined that list, a 13-year-old Swiss brown cow named Veronika.
NATE ROTT, BYLINE: Before we meet Veronika, it's worth explaining how she came to scientists' attention. Alice Auersperg, a cognitive biologist at the University of Veterinary Medicine Vienna, wrote a book about animal innovations that published last year. And after that, she started getting all sorts of videos from people.
ALICE AUERSPERG: Telling me that they think that their animal was using a tool.
ROTT: For example...
AUERSPERG: Cats using Amazon boxes as tools for housing. There were videos of dogs using sticks to brush their teeth.
ROTT: Or maybe they were just chewing, which kind of illustrates the bigger problem.
AUERSPERG: Not even the scientists are really clear about what tool use really is.
ROTT: Auersperg has a very technical definition. But she says the simplest way to understand it is to think of Baloo the bear from "The Jungle Book," when he starts scratching his back on a tree.
(SOUNDBITE OF FILM, "THE JUNGLE BOOK")
PHIL HARRIS: (As Baloo) That's delicious. Oh. Ooh.
AUERSPERG: But at some point, it becomes so enjoyable that Baloo grabs the tree and pulls it out and starts going after body regions that Baloo wouldn't have otherwise reached.
(SOUNDBITE OF FILM, "THE JUNGLE BOOK")
HARRIS: (As Baloo) Yeah.
AUERSPERG: And this is the point where the behavior switches from just object-oriented behavior to embody tool use.
ROTT: Which brings us to Veronika, an itchy cow living in the Austrian countryside. One of the videos Auersperg received was of Veronika using a stick clasped in her mouth to scratch her stomach and back. So she and a colleague went to visit.
AUERSPERG: And we landed in this beautiful place, which looks like something out of "The Sound Of Music."
ROTT: High mountains, green pastures, church bells literally ringing.
(SOUNDBITE OF CHURCH BELLS RINGING)
ROTT: They took videos like the kind you're hearing now. And almost immediately after Veronika's owner dropped a stick in front of her...
AUERSPERG: Veronika just rolled out her pink tongue. With the tip of the tongue, she grabbed, like, with an index finger, the stick, pulled the tongue back into the mouth.
ROTT: Grasping the stick between her teeth.
AUERSPERG: And Veronika just turned her head and started scratching her rear end.
ROTT: Auersperg and her colleague, Antonio Osuna-Mascaró, wanted to know how sophisticated this behavior really was, so they started testing her by providing her with a different tool, a broom.
ANTONIO OSUNA-MASCARÓ: Because a broom has a functional and nonfunctional end - right? - the broom side and the handle side.
ROTT: And over the course of 70 trials, Osuna-Mascaró says Veronika not only used the broom, she used each end for different purposes. The bristly end she'd scrape vigorously on the top of her body...
OSUNA-MASCARÓ: Where her skin is hard and thick.
ROTT: For her belly, udders and more sensitive areas, she used the handle end more delicately.
OSUNA-MASCARÓ: Gently poking and pushing, so two completely different techniques.
ROTT: Osuna-Mascaró and Auersperg says their findings, published in the journal Current Biology, show for the first time that cattle, long-derided as dumb, can also use tools.
ROB SHUMAKER: Is it tool use? I believe the answer is unequivocally, yes.
ROTT: Rob Shumaker is the president and CEO of the Indianapolis Zoo and the coauthor of the book, "Animal Tool Behavior." And he says this finding is really exciting.
SHUMAKER: But it is not as unique as the authors suggest.
ROTT: Goats have been found to scratch themselves with sticks, so have water buffalo. Still, he says, it's further proof that animal tool use might be more common than we tend to think.
Nate Rott, NPR News.
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